Dear Diary
by RJ.E-scope.DxC
Summary: Heather Chandler. Gwen Duke. Lindsay McNamara. Courtney Sawyer. Together they make the most powerful clique at Westerburg High. People would die to get into it... Courtney would kill to get out of it. Enter Duncan Dean: he has a way with women, a way with words, and a very special way with a gun. A Total Drama Heathers AU. Crossposted on AO3.
1. Cafeteria

_Dear Diary,_

 _Heather told me that she teaches people real life. She said "Real life sucks losers dry. You want to fuck with the eagles? You gotta learn to fly."_

 _I said "So you teach people to spread their wings and fly?"_

 _She said "Yes."_

 _I said "You're beautiful."_

 _A sharp kick to her side distracted Courtney Sawyer from where she was scribbling in her diary, seated at the bottom of a staircase in the first floor hallway of Westerberg High. She hurriedly removed the monocle from her right eye and looked up at her assailant: black skirt, yellow blazer, white shirt, blonde hair. Lindsay McNamara, the third most popular girl in school, after Heather and Courtney herself._

"God, come _on_ , Courtney!" was all Lindsay offered as an explanation for the violence. Courtney glared right back.

"What's your damage, Lindsay?!" she snapped. Lindsay wasn't the kicking type normally; which meant that someone must have sent her with a message. While Lindsay McNamara excelled at gossiping, cheerleading and scoring dates, she did not have a stellar memory, so all messages had to be delivered as quickly as possible.

Lindsay rolled her eyes. "Don't blame me, blame Heather. She told me to haul your ass to the caf, pronto." She glanced at the shorter, dark-haired girl hovering next to her. "Back me up, Gwen."

Gwen Duke nodded, straightening her own green blazer. She was a tiny, dark-haired waif of a girl, clutching a tattered copy of J.D Salinger's _The Catcher In The Rye_ as if it was some sort of talisman. "Yeah, she really wants to talk to you, Courtney." Her voice was scratchy and quiet. If Gwen was here, Heather must have been in one of her moods – either grumpy or malicious. Gwen tended to take the brunt of Heather's moods, no matter the nature or cause.

Courtney snapped her diary shut and gathered her belongings, tossed carelessly onto the step next to her. "OK, OK, I'm going," she groaned. "Jésus."

When they entered the cafeteria, there was no need to search for Heather; she was instantly visible standing in the middle of the room with her back to them. Her fitted grey plaid blazer, red shorts, white tights and black shoes weren't couture; they didn't need to be. Heather Chandler had all the power she needed just from her presence alone. She was the sort of girl that everyone loved and feared at the same time, the kind your parents were afraid you'd get mixed up with, a lamp that drew in every moth for miles around. Even if the outfit wasn't instantly recognisable, her long black hair tied back with a huge red scrunchie was.

Courtney rolled her shoulders back and walked calmly over to her. She didn't fear Heather Chandler, but she was still in awe of her control over everyone. "Hello, Heather."

Heather turned, the malice glittering in her slanted grey eyes suggesting that she was vindictive rather than grumpy. As always, she didn't bother with pleasantries, but got straight to the point. "Courtney, I snagged biology notes off Brady Sweeney. I need you to use them to forge a hot and horny yet realistically subtle note, and we'll slip it onto Beth Dumptruck's lunch tray." She patted her red-lacquered clipboard for emphasis.

Courtney winced. Even though it had been her amazing forgery skills that had won her a place in Heather's little Alliance, she hated using them for this kind of thing, and she said so: "Shit, Heather, I don't have anything against Beth Dunnstock."

Heather narrowed her eyes. "You don't have anything for her either! Come on; it'll be very. The note will give her…" she giggled, "shower-nozzle-masturbation material for weeks."

The brunette pressed her lips together. "I'll think about it," she conceded.

This clearly wasn't good enough for Heather, who gave her a sharp look. "Don't think."

Courtney sighed and glanced over at the lunch line, at Heather's chosen victim, who was currently guiltily sneaking a second pot of cafeteria jelly onto her tray. Beth Dunnstock wasn't massive, per se, but she was un-skinny enough that she was an easy target for Heather. Poor kid. High school was designed to tear girls like Beth to shreds. Courtney turned back to her master, eyes passing over Brady Sweeney fist-pounding his right-hand man, Scott Kelly. Both of them were football players who kept their brains in their underwear. Disgusting. Doubtless they were discussing something unsavoury to do with Heather. Or Gwen, or Lindsay, or even Courtney herself. She'd been forced to go out with Scott more than once, when Lindsay didn't want to be alone with Brady, and it was always a dreadful experience.

Heather was still waiting for an answer, and Courtney knew she wouldn't stop until she got what she wanted, so at last she nodded. "Fine."

Satisfied, Heather grinned at her lackeys. "Courtney's going to need something to lean on. Bend over."

It was unclear who she was talking to, and Lindsay and Gwen both bent over obediently, making Heather unleash a burst of violent laughter.

"How nice," she sneered. "Two assholes: no waiting."

Gwen and Lindsay both snapped back upright, flushing scarlet with embarrassment, and Heather glanced between them, deciding who to humiliate – or rather, pretending to decide. Everyone knew who she would choose.

"Gwen, back down. I'll dictate."

Gwen bent over again, offering her back to Courtney, who took the clipboard from Heather and checked Brady's Biology notes as Heather began speaking. "Dear Beth, you're so sweet…"

Over at the jocks' table, Brady himself was unaware that someone had stolen his notes and was currently listening to Scott rhapsodising about how "righteous" it would be "to be in a Courtney Sawyer-Heather Chandler sandwich. Punch it in, Brady."

Brady bumped his fist against Scott's with a nod and a grin. "Hell yes. I wanna set one of them on my Johnson and just start spinning her like a fucking pinwheel." He made a spinning motion with his index finger to underline his point.

Courtney had finished the note. As Gwen stood back up, cracking her back into place, the brunette tore the page off the clipboard and handed both back to Heather, who gave the handwriting an impressed look. Lindsay, meanwhile, was hawkishly watching their victim in the food line, and tugged excitedly on Heather's sleeve as Beth paid and left the line. Heather gave a tranquil smile, folded the note, and handed it to Lindsay, who sauntered between tables, chairs and students until she reached the slow-moving Beth. Reaching under Beth's arm, Lindsay wedged the note between the two pots of jelly and a paper plate nearly overflowing with food. She turned and jogged back to her friends, beaming as Heather nodded approvingly at her. The four girls headed over to their own table, passing Cody Anderson and Noah Dawson, who were working the Foodless Fund stand beneath a red banner that read ' **Westerburg Feeds The World!** ' in black bubble lettering.

"Come on, people!" Cody was currently preaching. "Let's give that leftover lunch money to people without lunches! Those tater tots you threw away today are a delicacy in Africa! They're Thanksgiving dinner!" Noah looked thoroughly bored behind him, nose in a thick Agatha Christie novel and one hand protectively on top of the cashbox.

Lindsay sat down and tilted her head confusedly at the stand. "God, aren't they fed yet?" she asked. "Do they even have Thanksgiving in Africa?"

"Oh, sure," Courtney said sarcastically. "Pilgrims, Indians, tater tots. It's a real party continent." Gwen huffed in amusement from behind her book, but judging by the way Lindsay's eyes widened and how she looked genuinely interested, she hadn't picked up on the sarcasm. Courtney groaned internally, then groaned externally when Heather tapped her perfectly manicured French tips on her clipboard.

"Sawyer. Guess what today is?"

Courtney made a face. She knew exactly what today was. "Ouch….the lunchtime poll. So what's the question?"

Gwen marked her page and leaned forwards with a smile. "Yeah, Heather, what's the question?"

Heather's mood changed from gloating to pissed in a millisecond. "Goddamn, Gwen, you were with me in Study Hall when I thought of it!"

Gwen gave her a doe-eyed look of hurt. "I forgot."

Heather tutted, her good mood returning with the opportunity to insult Gwen. "God, you're such a pillowcase."

Gwen retreated to her book as Heather and Courtney both got to their feet and left the table. It was Friday, which meant that instead of sitting down to lunch like normal, Heather and either Courtney, Gwen or Lindsay would spend the period asking the preps poll questions with topics that ranged from the obvious to the downright bizarre. There was normally no way of telling what it would be, as Heather never revealed which of her sources it came from. However, Courtney thought she might have an idea, and she said so. "Hey, this question wouldn't happen to be that bizarro thing you were babbling about over the phone last –"

"Shut up, it is," Heather snapped. "I told Noah that if he gave me another political topic, I'd spew burrito chunks."

Courtney rolled her eyes, and in doing so, made eye contact with a boy she didn't recognise sitting in the corner of the lunchroom. He had messy black hair with green tips, and wore a dark gunslinger coat that seemed to be a little too big for him. He raised his eyebrows at her, fluorescent light glinting off a little barbell piercing on the left brow.

Transfixed, Courtney stopped paying attention to where she was going and promptly tripped over someone sitting down at a nearby table. She hurriedly caught herself as the girl apologised.

"Sorry, Courtney."

Courtney looked up, recognising the voice. Her cheeks flushed in embarrassment. "Zoey Finn. Gosh…"

Zoey had red hair and freckles, and wore oversized horn-rimmed glasses. Her clothes were about 30 years out of date, but wouldn't have been out of place in a 50s Malt Shop. She and Courtney had been best friends once upon a time, but had been forced to drift apart when Courtney had begun hanging out with Heather. They still tried to maintain a sort of long-distance friendship, but Zoey was making far more of an effort than Courtney. Courtney felt bad, but Heather didn't like her hanging out with people she hadn't approved. And Zoey's taste in clothes meant that she would never be approved.

That didn't mean Courtney had to be rude though, and she smiled at Zoey now, a little apologetically. "Hey, I'm really sorry I couldn't make it to your birthday party last month."

Zoey gave her an understanding smile. "That's OK. Your Mom said you had a big date. Heck, I'd probably skip my own birthday party for a date."

Courtney chuckled, a little sadly. The date – a double with Scott and Lindsay and Brady – had been awful. "Don't say that."

Zoey's brown eyes brightened. "Oh, Court, you have to look at what I dug up the other day!" She rummaged in her purse, carefully removing an old photograph. Courtney practically glowed with fondness; it showed the two girls, aged about eight, in Halloween costumes: Zoey an angel, and Courtney a witch. It was adorable – which was probably why Heather yanked her away a second later. The photograph fell onto the floor, and Zoey hurried to pick it up and put it away as Courtney hissed angrily at Heather.

"I was talking with someone!"

"Colour me impressed," Heather snarked. "I thought you grew out of Zoey Finn."

They were approaching the prep table, and were near enough to hear the conversation there, which was rapidly dying down with their imminent arrival.

"Oh great," one of the girls – Staci – said sourly. "Here comes Heather."

"Shit," muttered one of the boys – probably Justin.

Maybe the preps didn't know it, but Courtney knew Heather could hear them. And she also knew that Heather didn't give a shit. No matter what the preps said when they thought Heather couldn't hear them, they would practically trip over themselves to fawn over her when she spoke to them.

Heather opened this conversation with a wide smile that to the untrained eye looked friendly, but to those who knew her, was instantly recognisable as her 'you'd better do exactly as I say' look. "Hi, Staci," she said sweetly. "Love your sweater. Ooh, let me snare a tater."

Staci looked delighted at receiving a compliment from Heather Chandler herself, and pushed her lunch tray in Heather's direction. Heather delicately took a tater tot and turned to face Courtney, sticking out her tongue and pointing down her throat before popping the tater tot into her mouth. Her meaning could not have been clearer: blegh. Courtney huffed an inaudible laugh as Heather turned back to the table, where Staci was telling everyone about her black-and-white-striped sweater. "Thanks, Heather! I just got it last night at the Limited." She giggled and lowered her voice conspiratorially. "Totally blew my allowance."

Heather raised her eyebrows and her clipboard. "That's pretty very," she commented, before turning business-like. "Now, check this out. You win five million dollars from Publishers Sweepstakes, but on the same day what's-his-face gives you the cheque, aliens land on the Earth and say they're going to blow it up in two days. What would you do?"

The entire table looked stunned at the question, and Courtney didn't blame them. She herself was hovering somewhere between 'what the fuck' and 'thank you for allowing me to see their faces when you asked this question'.

Justin was the first to move. "That's easy," he replied with a smug grin. "I'd just slide that wad over to my father. He's, like, one of the top brokers in Canada."

Courtney snorted. "Wake up. In two days, Earth's going up like a Roman Candle. Crab Nebula city." She'd forgotten how much she hated talking to these kids. They had bigger egos than Heather herself – but then again, Heather's ego was understandable. She had the power to back it up; these kids didn't, which was what made them so insufferable.

Justin continued to prove her point, flicking a dark fringe out of his eyes. "Man, in two days, my dad could double my money. Triple it."

Courtney was about five seconds from walking away when Staci dealt the final blow. "If I got that money, I'd give it all to the Homeless," she announced piously. "Every cent."

Courtney shook her head almost imperceptibly. "You're beautiful," she said flatly, before turning on her heel and hurrying away. Heather was finishing copying down Staci's answer, but caught up to Courtney about three tables away, grabbing her arm and yanking her to a halt.

"If you're going to openly be a bitch…" she trailed off, leaving the threat unfinished.

Courtney laughed submissively. "It's just… shit, Heather," she shook her head again. "Why can't we talk to different kinds of people for once?"

Heather's perfectly drawn-on eyebrows shot up so quickly, Courtney was a little scared they might fly off her face. "Fuck me gently with a chainsaw!" Heather snarled. "Do I look like Mother Theresa to you? If I did, I probably wouldn't mind eating lunch with the Geek Squad." She pointed at a group of unfashionably dressed boys who all wore some combination of glasses, braces, suspenders and bowties. As if to underline the statement, one of them spat out a mouthful of cafeteria-brand milk.

"Did you guys see that?" he was whispering excitedly to his friends. "Heather Chandler just looked right at me!"

"It must be love," one of his friends snarked back.

Courtney tilted her head, surveying Heather through lowered lashes. "Doesn't it bother you that everyone in this school thinks you're a piranha?" she asked softly.

Heather's reply was equally soft, but twenty times more threatening. "Like I give a shit. They all want me as a friend or a fuck. I'm worshipped at Westerburg, and I'm only a junior."

"Pretend you're a missionary saving a colony of cootie victims," Courtney suggested, almost pleading. She couldn't face talking to any more preps; at least talking to other kinds of students might give them some interesting answers.

Heather's perfect face pinched in distaste, but to Courtney's surprise, she nodded. "Whatever," she said in response to the wide-eyed look of shock Courtney gave her. "I don't believe this. We're going to a party at Remington University tonight, and we're brushing up on our social skills with the scum of the school."

The geeks seemed oddly fidgety when the two girls approached them; apparently unsure of how to act in front of the alpha predators of Westerburg. They froze up the second Heather opened her mouth though. It was always the same, everyone hanging onto her every word.

"This is what's called a lunchtime poll. We ask a question, you answer. You win five million dollars from Publishers Sweepstakes, but the same day the guy gives you the cheque, aliens land on the earth and say they're gonna blow it up in two days. What do you do?"

Once the naturally shocked reactions were out of the way, the geeks actually thought about the question. It was a pleasant change from the self-assured attitudes of the preps.

The same boy who had spluttered milk down himself earlier was the first to answer, straightening his tiny round spectacles. "No, seriously, I'd probably go to Egypt. With a girl."

His cynical friend snorted. "Taking a hooker to the Pyramids on the last day of mankind. You sentimental old fart."

"Geez, forget it."

Courtney turned to another boy, a red-haired twig with spaghetti limbs, thick glasses, and a whispy teenage moustache. "What about you, Harold?"

Harold's eyes lit up and he muttered something to his friends that sounded suspiciously like "Told you she knew my name," before answering her. "I'd change my life, I guess. New clothes. New haircut. New house. New me."

Heather almost cackled with contempt. "How sad! Blowing all your cash on two days of trying to be hip!"

Courtney yanked the guffawing girl away from the geeks' table, glaring. "If you're going to openly be a bitch…" she repeated Heather's earlier threat. Heather shook her head, a smirk playing around her mouth, and Courtney again caught sight of the boy with green hair. He wiggled his eyebrows, and she raised her own in response, but her attention was caught by Lindsay excitedly tugging her sleeve.

"God, scan on Beth Dumptruck!" she giggled. Courtney followed her gaze. Beth looked flustered, glancing between the note and Brady at the jocks' table. She was somehow doing this while continuing to shovel jelly into her mouth, and Courtney suddenly felt very sorry for her.

Heather had finally got her giggles under control, and she tutted in Beth's direction. Not in pity, but in impatience.

"This is the part I hate," she sighed. "The waiting. I'd say we're, like, twenty minutes from major humiliation." She spun on her heel. "Come on, Courtney."

Courtney followed her out to the parking lot, hating herself for going along with Heather. They were approaching a group of heavy metalers, who were lazily leaning against the hood of a battered pickup truck. Heather repeated her spiel and waited for them to answer the bizarre question.

One of them, a tubby boy with greasy brown hair to his shoulders grinned at the question and nudged his friend in delight. "You get five million dollars but some Martians are going to zap you in two days. You hear that, Rock? That's got to be the most spooky-ass question I've ever heard."

Rock nodded in agreement, grinning as well. "If you want a good way to go out before the aliens land," he started, and Heather readied her pen and clipboard, "get a lion from the zoo. Put a remote-control bomb up its butt. When the lion starts tearing you up, press the bomb button. You and the lion die as one."

The other two leaning against the hood – a boy and a girl, who seemed to be a couple – nodded in agreement. "Cool."

"Thank you," Heather trilled, before dragging Courtney back inside. Courtney was too disturbed to respond.

Next they headed back into the cafeteria, where they approached Zoey Finn's table again and repeated the question. Zoey raised her hand like she was in class, and Heather nodded at her, giving her permission to speak, with an air of bizarre delight. "I think we should use the money for an End-of-the-world get-together," Zoey smiled sweetly. Her cheeks coloured. "We could invite _guys_."

The jocks' table was next, and the two girls approached it with some apprehension – and with good reason. A few seconds after Heather finished her introduction and question, Brady sputtered out some chicken to bellow, "I'd pay Madonna one million dollars to ride my face like the Kentucky Derby." He swallowed and considered it for a moment, before adding, "She should be paying me, though."

Thankfully, Heather dragged Courtney over to the Foodless Fund stand before she could curse the linebacker out for his disgusting sexism. Cody listened with interest, and carefully considered the question before beginning to answer. "This is important… with taxes, I'd only be getting 3.5 million, and…" Courtney tuned out.

When Cody had finished his longwinded reply (or perhaps been cut off by Heather), Courtney found herself being led into a dimly lit corridor full of smoke. The two girls coughed their way towards a group of stoners wearing tatty jeans and bomber jackets, and once again, Heather asked the question. Thankfully, this group's answer was short:

"…what?"

As they made their way back to the cafeteria, Heather admired her list of answers, which was far longer than usual. "Look at all the answers those losers gave me," she purred. "So pathetic. Makes me feel almost sorry for them… almost. Cody's not changed a bit, and as for Zoey Finn? A party with boys! Or, as normal people call it, a party! Ha!"

"Damn you, Heather," Courtney spoke out loud for the first time since leaving the geeks' table. "Deep down all teenagers are the same. Didn't you see The Breakfast Club?"

Heather didn't even look up from her clipboard to snort derisively. "Look at me. I look great. I'm the girl in the commercials and the videos. I'm the babe in the bikini on the horse holding a Pepsi can. I'm the princess being spanked on the throne by Billy Idol's guitarist's guitar." She finally looked up, giving Courtney a cold, pitying look. "What do I get out of being friends with losers? I give them a piece of a winner and they stain me with loserness. Just imagine somebody like your quasi-fat, goody-goody friend Zoey Finn doing a Crest commercial. No one would buy Crest."

"Don't tell me. Crest would be stained with loserness."

"Yeah, and who wants that on their teeth?" Heather laughed. They'd arrived back at their table, and Lindsay was practically squirming with delight. Gwen had even looked up from her book in interest.

Lindsay pointed over at Beth's table. "Oh God, here we go…"

Beth was getting up. She was stumbling over to where Brady and Scott sat in their bastion of vulgarity. She was mumbling something unintelligible in Brady's direction. She was showing him the note…

Brady scanned the note, his laughter detonating with a terrifying cackle. Scott peered over at it and joined him, and soon the entire table was in hysterics. Beth looked ready to cry as she hurried out of the cafeteria. Heather, Gwen and Lindsay were laughing too, but Courtney turned away in disgust. Once again, she caught the green-haired boy staring at her, and could make out the same disturbed look on his face that she knew was currently adorning her own. She turned away, lurching towards the Foodless Fund stand and leaning against it. Cody was still hollering away.

"A dime increases the time! A buck brings good luck – oh, hi, Courtney. A five keeps the neighbourhood alive! A ten and you die without sin!"

Without her noticing, Heather had prowled over to Courtney with an unreadable expression on her face. She winged a twenty into the cashbox, and dragged Courtney away from the stand, clearly not wanting Cody to hear what she had to say.

"You wanted to become a member of the most powerful clique in school," she reminded Courtney, who scowled at the memory of allowing Heather to mould her into the pseudo-Goddess everyone apparently viewed her as. "If I wasn't already the head of it, I'd want the same thing."

"I'm sorry?" Courtney feigned ignorance, but she knew exactly what Heather was getting at. "What are you oozing about?"

Heather rolled her eyes, but answered anyway. "That episode with the note back there was for all of us to enjoy, but you seem determined to ruin my day."

Courtney let out a burst of fake laughter that made the nearest students turn around in curiosity. They immediately turned away again when they noticed who had let loose the laughter, though. No one wanted to be caught in Heather's tunnel vision when Courtney undoubtedly pissed her off. "We made a girl want to consider suicide. What a scream. What a jest."

Heather rolled her eyes, already grabbing her by the arm to drag her somewhere new, just as she had been all lunch. "Come on, you jerk. You know you used to have a sense of humour."

They joined Lindsay and Gwen in the bathroom, lining up in front of the mirror to brush their hair. Lindsay and Heather were delighting in doing impressions of Beth speaking to Brady.

"Brady, let' _th_ pa-arty!" Heather cackled, and Lindsay joined in.

"Brady, I ne-ed an orga- _th_ -m!

Gwen hadn't joined in, instead retreating into a stall. Her gentle voice sliced through Lindsay's giggles: "Courtney? Could you come back here for a sec?"

Heather and Lindsay paused in their laughter. "Gross!"

There was a lot about her friendship with these girls that Courtney hated, but nothing made her feel as bad as this task did. She raised her eyebrows at the two girls next to her and wiggled her right index finger. The nail was cut noticeably shorter than the rest. "A true best friend's work is never done," she quipped as she joined Gwen in the stall and locked the door.

Heather's voice rang through the bathroom. "Grow up, Gwen. Bulimia is so '87."

"Colour me nauseous," Lindsay gagged.

Gwen looked ashamed, and Courtney winced. "Maybe you should see a doctor about this."

"Yeah, maybe." She looked a little less embarrassed, but then Heather spoke again.

"Come on Gwen, we want another look at today's lunch!"

"Jésus, don't listen to them," Courtney murmured, but Lindsay interrupted her.

"Did she have the pie or the ice-cream for desert?" she laughed. The cheerleader put on a game-show-host voice. "And for thirty points, the answer is…"

Gwen ignored her, lifting her battered book and smiling almost defiantly. "Yeah, you know Holden Caulfield in _The Catcher In The Rye_ wouldn't put up with their bogus nonsense."

"Yeah, well, you'd better move Holden out of the way or he's going to get spewed," Courtney muttered. Gwen nodded, putting down the book and opening her mouth, and Courtney took a deep breath and stuck her finger in.

When they emerged from the bathroom, Courtney's gaze was once again caught by the James Dean-esque guy sitting in the corner. He was staring into space, and Lindsay jabbed an elbow sharply into Courtney's side.

"God, Courtney, drool much?" she laughed. "He's new, in my Canadian History. His name's Danny Dolittle, or David Dawson, or something like that."

Courtney nodded, coming to a decision. "Heather, give me the clipboard."

Heather raised an eyebrow, relinquishing her grip on her precious clipboard, and Courtney began walking towards the boy's table, seemingly in a trance. Her friends gazed after her, Lindsay oinking out an amused sexual groan.

As Courtney reached the table, the boy looked up at her. He had teal eyes that glittered with both attraction and apprehension, and she gave him her best politician's smile. "Hey there."

A smile pulled at the corner of his mouth. "Greetings and salutations. You wouldn't be the infamous Heather Chandler I've been hearing so much about?"

Courtney laughed – she was genuinely amused, but her laugh still sounded fake from faking laughter for so long. "No, I'm Courtney. Courtney Sawyer." She glanced down at the clipboard to gather herself – something about his eyes made her want to keep staring into them forever. "Uh, this may seem like a stupid question…"

The boy raised his eyebrows, making the barbell-piercing glitter. "There are no stupid questions."

Courtney raised her eyebrows right back. "You inherit five million dollars the same day aliens land on the Earth and say they're gonna blow it up in two days. What do you do?"

The boy furrowed his eyebrows and chuckled incredulously. "That's got to be the stupidest question I've ever heard," he said suavely, making Courtney giggle again.

Brady and Scott glared jealously over from the jocks' table as Courtney grinned warmly at the boy in the trench coat. "Who does that new kid think he is with that coat?" Brady snarled through a mouthful of potatoes. "Bo Diddley?"

Scott leaned back with a scowl. "Courtney's into his act, no doubt."

"Let's kick his ass!"

"Shit, we're seniors, Brady," Scott rolled his eyes, yanking Brady back into his seat from where he'd half-risen to his feet. "Too old for that shit." He smirked a little. "Let's give him a good scare, though."

Duncan looked intrigued as he laconically answered the question. "Probably just row out to the middle of a lake. Bring along my Fender, some tequila, and some Bach."

Courtney felt her cheeks flush a little. "How very," she murmured, copying down his reply before looking up. "Hey, I didn't catch your name."

The boy grinned widely. "I didn't throw it."

 _Fuck._ Luckily, Heather appeared at Courtney's shoulder before she could do something stupid, like melt into a puddle or ask the boy to marry her. "Come on," she said sharply, and Courtney smiled dreamily at the boy.

"Later," she breathed.

The boy looked her up and down with a very attractive half-smile. "Definitely."

"Courtney!" Heather hissed, and Courtney obediently followed her, somehow unable to wipe the grin off her face. The second she was out of sight, Brady and Scott moved into her place, staring down at the new kid with narrowed eyes. Brady stuck his finger into a piece of pie the boy hadn't started on yet.

"You going to eat this?" he said softly.

Scott leaned in with icy eyes. "What did your boyfriend say when you told him you were moving to Muskoka, Ontario?"

The boy was silent, and Brady glared. "Answer him, dick!"

Scott grinned, turning to his partner in crime. "Hey, Brady, doesn't this cafeteria have a 'No Fags Allowed' Rule?"

Brady grinned back. "Sure does."

The boy leaned back in his seat, jutting his chin up confidently. "Yeah, it seems to have an open-door policy for assholes though, doesn't it?"

Both jocks' jaws dropped open in shock. "What did you say, dickhead?" Scott spluttered. He looked and sounded genuinely confused that someone had answered back.

The boy smirked. "I'll, uh, repeat myself." He stood gracefully, reached into his coat and pulled out a .357 Magnum, lifting it to point directly at them. Brady and Scott stepped back in shock, and the boy grinned and fired twice.


	2. Croquet

"God, they won't expel him!" Lindsay laughed. The four girls were in Courtney's backyard, playing croquet and discussing the new kid's devil-may-care attitude. "They'll just suspend him for a week or so!"

"He used a real gun," Heather said coldly. "They should throw his ass in _jail."_

"No way!" Courtney said – more defensively than she'd intended. But she couldn't help but be impressed with the way the new kid had handled Brady and Scott. "He used blanks," she reminded them. "All he really did was ruin a couple of pairs of underwear – and maybe not even that." She caught Gwen's eye with a grin. "Can you bleach out urine stains?"

Heather ignored Gwen and Lindsay's giggles and continued to stare at her scarlet croquet ball. "You seem pretty amused," she said softly – but still as cold as ever. "I thought you had given up on high-school guys?"

Courtney shrugged, blowing her bangs out of her face. "Never say never," she quipped.

Heather scowled, and hit the red ball in the direction of Gwen's green ball. They connected with a soft clunk. Gwen glanced up at Heather. "So, what's it gonna be, Heather?" she asked. "Are you going to take the two shots, or send me out?"

Heather approached her slowly, an incredulous look on her pretty face. "Did you have a brain tumour for breakfast, Gwen? First you ask if you can be red, knowing that _I'm_ always red." She carefully placed one foot on top of her red croquet ball, which was still touching Gwen's green one, and smacked it hard with the mallet. The green ball went flying off behind a small water feature and landed next to the trees at the bottom of the garden.

It would be a near impossible shot, and they all knew it.

"Shit," Gwen said softly. Heather grinned, lining up her next shot – but this one fell short, making her scowl.

"It's your turn, Gwen."

Gwen shook her head. "No, it's Lindsay's turn." Lindsay obediently took her shot, hitting her yellow ball through a wicket with a squeal. Heather tossed her hair, seemingly composing herself.

"Anyway, I can say 'never' to high-school guys. I've got Alejandro."

Lindsay giggled childishly. _"King_ Alejandro." Alejandro was no king – he was a preppy, somewhat slimy twenty-something who was a student at the local University. To Heather, he served the dual purpose of 'boyfriend' and 'party-invitation-ticket', usually operating under the agreement that she would bring a 'hot Westerberg girl' for one of his equally slimy friends to hook up with. But with the way Heather went on about him, he might as well be royalty.

Heather pursed her lips. "Maybe when you hit maturity you'll understand the diff between a Remington University man like Alejandro and a Westerberg boy like Brady 'Wham-bam-thank-you-ma'am' Sweeney."

Lindsay shrugged, unperturbed. "Brady's sweet. Yo Gwen, you're up."

Gwen made her way around the water feature and positioned herself next to the croquet ball. Her friends offered 'encouragement' from the other side of the fountain.

"Easy shot, Gwen," Heather smirked.

"No way, no day," Lindsay shook her head.

"Give it up, girl," Courtney added.

Gwen scowled, and carefully hit the ball. It clanged off the metal clothesline pole, thunked off a tree, and rolled through the wicket. Heather looked astounded.

"God, that was incredible!" Lindsay beamed.

"Holy shit," Courtney added.

Heather narrowed her eyes. "What. A. Shot," she said flatly.

Gwen smiled and made her way back over to the garden. "Your turn, Lindsay."

Lindsay hit her ball towards another wicket, missing it, before looking over at Heather and Courtney with envious blue eyes. "So, tonight's the big night. You two excited?"

Heather pursed her lips. "I'm giving Courtney her shot. Her first Remington party." Heather usually brought Lindsay to these kinds of functions, but for some reason she'd decided to bring Courtney to this one, and now she looked over at her with a threatening grin playing around her mouth. "You blow it tonight, girl, and it's keggers with kids all next year."

"Crap," Courtney sighed. She made to take her shot, but missed, and looked back up at Heather. "So, who's this Topher guy I've been set up with? Witty and urbane pre-lawyer or albino accountant?"

"Don't worry," Heather assured her coolly. "Alejandro says he's very, so he's very." Once again, she smacked her ball into Gwen's. Gwen groaned.

 _"_ _Why?"_

Heather shrugged. "Why not?" She smiled, lined herself up, and slammed Gwen's ball back into the flowerbed. Gwen turned to follow it with a sigh, but luckily, Courtney's mother emerged from the house and interrupted her.

"Lindsay, your mother's here," she called to the girls. Lindsay grabbed her croquet mallet and dug the handle into the ground.

"Come on, whoever wants a ride," she smiled. Heather and Gwen dropped their croquet mallets next to Lindsay's and smiled at Mrs Sawyer as they headed back into the house. Courtney hurried to remove Gwen's ball from the flowerbed, dropping it next to the mallets, and her dad called over to her as he sat down in one of the deck chairs surrounding the table on the patio, Robert Ludlum book open on his knees.

"Take a break, Courtney, sit down."

Courtney smiled and sank into the deck chair next to his, while her mother placed a tray of pâté on the table and joined them. Mr Sawyer smiled at his daughter. "So, what was the first week of Spring Vacation withdrawal like?"

Courtney shrugged. "I don't know, it was OK, I guess."

Mrs Sawyer delicately popped a piece of pâté into her mouth and swallowed it without chewing. "Hey kid, isn't the prom coming up?" She smiled conspiratorially.

Courtney nodded. "I guess." Prom didn't interest her much. It was just another school dance, only this one was pretending to be the 'gateway into the adult world', their first taste of freedom. It had definitely lost its appeal after Courtney had begun attending the kind of parties Heather and Lindsay liked to throw.

Her mother was undeterred though. "Any contestants worth mentioning?"

Come to think of it, prom was a little more appealing after what had happened in the cafeteria this afternoon, and Courtney finally returned her mother's conspiratorial grin. "May _be._ There's kind of a 'dark horse' in the running."

While her mother looked delighted at Courtney's newfound enthusiasm, her father clearly hadn't been paying attention, nose firmly in his book. "Goddamn," he sighed, looking up. "Will somebody please tell me why I read this spy crap?"

Courtney's grin widened. "Because you're an idiot." It was an old joke between them – 'Why do I do this?' 'Because you're an idiot.' The joke had been used less and less frequently as Courtney got older, but it was still a nice occasional reminder of being young and innocent and not even knowing what a clique was.

Her father raised his eyebrows with a goofy grin. "Oh yeah, that's it."

Mrs Sawyer smiled fondly, shaking her head. "You two…"

Courtney grabbed a piece of pâté and chewed it hurriedly. "Great pâté, mom, but I'm going to have to motor if I want to be ready for that party tonight." She got to her feet and headed back into the house.

"Corn Nuts! Don't forget to buy Corn Nuts!" Heather Chandler's voice rang across the parking lot of the 7-11 from the window of her red Volkswagen Cabriolet. Courtney nodded as she tottered through the parking lot on her ridiculous built-for-style-not-comfort high-heels. "And not barbecue!"

"Yes, Heather," Courtney called back as she pushed open the door and her eyesight was assaulted by fluorescent tube lighting. The door swung shut behind her, like a barrier protecting her from Heather's instructions. Dressed-to-massacre in a stylish grey off-the-shoulder jumper and a tight black pinafore dress that hugged her curves, she looked surreally out of place in the Snappy Snack Shack. Courtney headed to the Corn Nuts display and grabbed a bag of dill-pickle flavour, but nearly dropped it upon hearing the voice behind her.

"Greetings and salutations. You going to pull a Big Gulp with that?" Courtney turned, and the boy from the cafeteria grinned back at her. He was still wearing his black gunslinger coat, which was still too big for him, and a lopsided smile that sent her heartbeat into overdrive. Hurriedly recalling everything Heather and Lindsay had ever told her about boys, she leaned back and surveyed him through her dark lashes with a haughty smile.

"No, but if you tell me your name I'll let you buy me a Slushy."

The boy grinned and held out a hand for her to shake. "I'll end the suspense. Duncan Dean, at your service." His nose scrunched up when he grinned, and she noticed that he had a little stud in his left nostril, to match the barbell in his eyebrow.

Courtney shook his hand with a giggle. "So, Duncan Dean. You know your convenience store-speak pretty well."

Duncan laughed. "I've been moved around all my life; Markham, Trout River, Quebec, Toronto, Muskoka Ontario, there's always a 7-11. Any town, any time, I can pop a Ham and Cheese in the microwave and feast on a Turbo Dog." He tapped his forehead with a wink. "Keeps me sane."

"Really?" Courtney challenged. "That thing in the caf today was pretty severe."

Duncan shrugged. "The extreme always makes in impression," he said wisely. "But you're right, it was severe." He reached for a plastic cup. "Did you say a Cherry or Coke slushy?"

"I didn't," Courtney smirked. "Cherry." Duncan grinned right back at her.

After paying for their snacks, they left the convenience store, and Duncan leaned against a motorcycle parked by the entrance. Courtney sipped her drink as she admired it. "Great bike." The sound of Heather's car horn blared through the parking lot, and Courtney threw a glare over her shoulder. Heather glared back, making a 'move along' gesture. Maybe it was Duncan's presence, or maybe it was the sugar rush, but something gave Courtney the courage to ignore her and turn back to the boy in the trench coat, who was currently lighting up a cigarette. He smiled at her compliment.

"Just a humble perk from my dad's Construction Company." He took a puff, looking contemplative, before adding, "Or should I say Deconstruction Company?"

"I don't know, should you?"

Duncan shrugged. "My father seems to enjoy tearing things down more than putting things up. Seen the commercial? 'I'm Big Bud Dean, and if it's in your way I'll make your day!'"

"Right!" Courtney said excitedly, recognising the jingle. "Then he pulls the plunger and the screen blows up –" she noticed the way Duncan's face had settled into icy indifference, and it was a second before she realised what was wrong. "Wait… that's your _dad?"_

"In all his toxic glory," Duncan said lightly, blowing out a thin stream of smoke. He shrugged, and the warmth returned to his voice. "But everyone's life's got static. Or is your life perfect?"

Courtney snorted. "Oh, sure, I'm on my way to a party at Remington University with the most popular girl in school." The car horn sounded again, and she winced. "No, my life's not perfect," she sighed, holding up a hand with two fingers to Heather. _Two minutes._ From the lack of sound of compressed air, Heather seemed placated. "I don't really like my friends."

Duncan laughed, tapping the ash off his cigarette. He had a nice laugh. Nothing about it was faked, and it was a nice change. "I don't really like your friends either."

"It's like…" Courtney made a frustrated noise as she searched for the right words, "they're people I work with, and our job is being popular and shit."

Duncan's laughter died down, and he looked her seriously in the eyes. "Maybe it's time you took a vacation."

Courtney's detour to talk to Duncan meant that they were fashionably late to the party. Heather led her through hallways and up stairs until they arrived at the correct dorm on the first floor. Alejandro was waiting for them outside, and didn't waste any time in wrapping an arm around Heather's waist and leading the two girls into the cramped, eclectically tacky dorm room. Music was pounding through the entire building, meaning they had to shout to be heard. Two boys were sitting on a cluttered desk, chatting it up. They both wore polyester shirts and worn corduroys; Courtney and Heather's high-couture clothes stood out here.

Alejandro pointed to a bed piled high with various jackets and sweaters. "Throw your coats on the bed, girls."

As Courtney removed her black pea coat, she caught a snippet of the conversation of the boys on the desk.

"That exam was so bogus."

"Oh, I _know_ … which exam?"

Courtney could already feel the headache coming on. It got worse when Alejandro pointed to the first boy, who had brown hair pushed back off his forehead. "Courtney, this is Topher. Topher, this is Courtney, Heather's friend I told you about."

Topher slid off the desk, eyes already flicking up and down Courtney's body. "Excellent," he laughed, and Courtney gave an uncomfortable smile. "So, did you girls bring your partying slippers?"

Heather tossed her perfectly curled black hair. She wasn't wearing her scrunchie tonight. "Yeah," she laughed. "Let's party." Courtney frowned. Heather's voice was still cool and confident, but she sounded the most uncomfortable Courtney had ever heard her. It was nothing more than a tiny waver in her laugh, but still, it made Courtney tense up.

Alejandro laughed and nudged Topher. "She loves to party." Topher grinned and whispered something to Alejandro that made both of them snarl off a laugh. Courtney forced her smile to stay in place.

 _For Heather. I'm doing this for Heather._


	3. Party

Courtney sat alone at her desk, sobbing angrily as she scribbled in her diary. It had to be nearly 2 in the morning, but both sleep and calm were avoiding her like she was poisonous. She felt like she might explode from the rage bubbling up inside her. She'd definitely never felt any anger as strongly as this before. She and Heather had both crossed a line that night that they could never retreat from.

 _Dear Diary –_

 _I want to kill, and you have to believe it's for more than selfish reasons, more than a spoke in my menstrual cycle._

 _You have to believe me._

 **About four hours earlier**

Heather and Alejandro had vanished from the party together shortly after the girls had arrived, leaving Courtney alone with Topher. He'd handed her a plastic cup of beer, which she'd politely accepted, despite hating the taste. Then he'd begun trying to make small talk.

"So, are you a cheerleader?"

Courtney rolled her eyes before replying flatly. "No. Not at all."

"You're pretty enough to be one," Topher smarmed.

"Gee, thanks."

Topher hadn't taken the hint though. "It's so great to be able to talk to a girl and not have to ask 'What's your major?'" he chuckled awkwardly. "I hate that." Courtney smiled blithely and took a sip of beer, wincing. Topher copied her, but the pause in conversation could only last so long.

"So… when you go to college, what kind of subjects do you think you'll study?"

As this was happening, Heather and Alejandro were in Alejandro's bedroom, surrounded by obnoxious Ferrari posters while they kissed on his bed – well, Alejandro was kissing Heather, who awkwardly pulled away after a few moments.

"Come on, Al, shouldn't we go back to the party?"

Alejandro winced at the nickname, but continued pulling her closer. "We will, don't worry," he assured her, fumbling with his fly. "You're just so hot tonight. I can't control myself." Heather nodded and obediently yielded when he began pushing her head down.

Topher was still trying to draw Courtney into conversation, and she continued to play dumb. She'd hated his kind of college boys even before meeting Duncan, and hated them more than ever now she knew that someone so anti-jerk-culture existed.

"So what do you say we head up to my room and have a real party?" Topher suggested. "I've got the best Windham Hill CD collection in the dorm."

You didn't need to be a rocket scientist to work out what he was implying, but thankfully, Topher's friend from earlier had approached before she could tell him exactly what she thought of that idea.

"Christopher," his friend sing-songed, clearly more than a little drunk already, "Zeke's looking for you. He says he owes you for blow and he just got some product himself."

"You're kidding," Topher said disbelievingly. "That pecker actually scored something on his own?"

His friend shrugged, already ambling off. "He's in Amy's room, big guy. Party up."

"Excellent!" Topher chuckled, wrapping an arm around Courtney's shoulders. "Courtney, ever do cocaine?"

Courtney ducked away from him. "Ever since Phil Collins did that anti-drug thing on MTV, I refuse everything," she informed him flatly, to which he laughed obnoxiously.

"Phil Collins? Are you sure he isn't drinking and driving?"

"Jésus, right, then why don't I do drugs?" Courtney muttered sarcastically. Topher clearly hadn't picked up on her sarcasm, but thankfully, let her be.

"Right. Hey, don't run away now," he teased, before squirming away. Courtney waited until he was out of sight before dashing from the hallway back into the room where she'd left her coat.

 **Present**

 _Seventeen is the last year Mom buys the Twinkies. When you make the jump from working weekends at Pizza Hut to thirty years at I.B.M., you lose something. Not innocence – power._

Her cat, Brittany, chose that moment to jump onto the desk, landing on her diary. Courtney grabbed her around the middle and deposited her on the floor, and the Maine Coone screeched and angrily leapt onto the bed, tucking her fluffy tail around her body. Courtney continued to scribble in her diary.

 _Christ, I can't explain it, but I'm allowed an understanding that my parents and these Remington University assholes have chosen to ignore. I understand that I_ _must_ _stop_ _Heather._

 **Three hours ago**

Courtney collapsed onto a sofa in the dorm, snatching up a bottle of vodka from the stockpile of liquor at the end of the bed. She poured some into her cup of beer and took a sip, before promptly spitting it back into the cup and tossing it onto the desk next to her. She vaguely remembered having a 7-11 box of matches in her coat pocket, and rummaged through the pile until she found it. Slouching back onto the sofa, she pulled a match from the box and lit it. Something in the back of her head told her to touch it, and she found herself bringing the match closer to her hand until she could feel the heat coming off it. The heat seemed to snap her out of her trance, and she flung the match away from her. It landed in her abandoned drink, setting the vodka on fire. Courtney laughed almost automatically, although it had a hollow quality to it, and hurried to toss the cup out of the window. She didn't notice it landing in a rusted garbage can under the window, the flames spreading to the trash…

Heather found herself alone in a bathroom, and snatched up a glass that had been propped next to one of the sinks. As she filled it, she took in her own appearance in the mirror. Her hair, which had been perfectly coiffed when she'd arrived at the party, was now flat and pushed out of place. Her pearl necklace hung awkwardly around her neck, and there was a stain on the front of her stylish red dress. She glared, flicking off the tap, and gargled the water, before spitting it at the mirror.

Courtney closed the window just as Topher opened the door. "How's my little cheerleader?" he chirped. White powder crusted the rim of one nostril, and his pupils were tiny. He shut the door behind him, grinning at her, and she stared stonily back. "Now I know everyone at your high school isn't so uptight," he wheedled. "Come on!"

Courtney backed away, stomach churning. "Hey really, I don't feel so great –" she started, but he interrupted her, flopping down on the bed and bouncing.

"Let's do it on the coats, it'll be excellent!"

Enough was enough. It was time to blow this popsicle stand. Courtney gave him another flat smile. "I have a little prepared speech I give when my suitor wants more than I like to give him," she informed him. "Gee, Blank, I had a nice –"

Topher once again interrupted her, leaning back to grin at her upside down. "Save the speeches for Malcolm X," he wiggled his eyebrows at her. "I just wanna get laid."

Courtney snapped. "You don't deserve my _fucking_ speech!" she hissed. With that, she yanked her coat from underneath him, making him slide head-first onto the floor, and stormed out of the dorm and into the hallway. People were staring at her, and she slowed down as she continued towards the door. Her stomach churned, and her head was spinning from the bitter smell of smoke that seemed a staple of all college parties. Breathing deeply, she leaned her head against the wall and glanced over her shoulder. Her headache had calmed, but returned in full force when she noticed Topher slithering out of the dorm and down the hall towards where Alejandro was stood with Heather on his arm, chatting to some of his friends with an easy smile on his face. The smile diminished slightly when Topher hissed something into his ear, and he turned to Heather, muttering something to her. Heather set down her beer and paced towards Courtney, who realised too late that she was in trouble.

"What's your damage?" Heather hissed. "Topher says you're being a real _cooze."_

Courtney stared up at the taller girl desperately. "Heather, I feel awful, like I'm going to throw up. Can we jam, _please?"_

Heather's jaw dropped. "No," she said incredulously. " _Hell_ no!"

Courtney lurched forward and promptly emptied her stomach onto the carpet. As she straightened back up, a coldly satisfied smile broke across Heather's face.

 **Present**

 _Zoey Finn was a true friend and I sold her out for a bunch of Swatchdogs and Diet Cokeheads. Killing Heather would be like offing the Wicked Witch of the West. Or is it East?_ _West!_ _God, I sound like a fucking psycho._

 _Tomorrow I'll be kissing her aerobicized ass, but tonight, let me dream of a world without Heather. A world where I am free._

 **Two hours ago**

Courtney hurried out of the dorm and into the alley, where the trashcan she'd unintentionally set light was still bellowing like Mount Vesuvius, throwing grotesque shadows around the liminal space. Heather followed her sedately, but her eyes were blazing.

"You. Stupid. _Fuck!"_ she hissed. Courtney turned to her with a glare.

"You goddamn bitch!" she snarled back. The flames bathed Heather's face in a demonic glow as her composure snapped.

"You were nothing before you met me!" Heather shrieked. "You were playing Barbies with Zoey Finn! You were a Brownie. You were a Bluebird! You were a Girl Scout _Cookie!_ I got you into a Remington Party, and what's my thanks? It's on the hallway carpet! I got paid in _puke!"_

Courtney glared coldly back. She was so done with Heather, done with all of this. "Lick it up, baby. Lick. It. Up."

Heather's eyes widened, but she composed herself in record time, and her voice was the iciest Courtney had ever heard it. "Monday morning, you're history," she said quietly. "I'll tell everyone about tonight. You'll be less than a nobody; you'll be an ex-somebody. Not even the losers will touch you. Transfer to Washington. Transfer to Jefferson. No one at Westerburg's going to let you play their reindeer games." She turned and headed back inside. Courtney stood motionless for what seemed like hours, although it was barely more than a few seconds, before fleeing.

 **Present.**

Her entry complete, Courtney let out a final sob before slamming the diary shut and flinging it across the room. Brittany hissed as it crashed into the wall next to the window, making the person climbing into the room fall off the sill with a crash.

Wait.

What?

Duncan Dean straightened up, brushing his coat off. "Dreadful etiquette. I apologise," he said, smiling softly at her. Courtney huffed in disbelief, a smile tugging at her own mouth.

"S'okay," she murmured. Duncan picked up the diary and handed it back to her.

"I saw the croquet set-up in the back. Up for a match?"

The normal question in such an abnormal situation was like a welcoming tug out of her own head, and Courtney smiled fully for the first time in what seemed like forever. "Sure. But I'm Blue."

 **An hour later**

The garden was blanketed in both serenity and abandoned clothes. Next to the first wicket rested a pair of black high-heeled shoes and a pair of battered red Converse.

"Goddamn. No wonder you looked so mangled when I came through the window."

A pair of blue stockings and a pair of white boys' socks were crumpled by the next wicket.

"I've always treated Heather's teen queen power plays as bullshit…" Courtney paused, staring over at the third wicket, where her stylish grey jumper and Duncan's black skull-adorned shirt were piled together, "…but I'm really scared. Who am I going to eat lunch with on Monday?" she chuckled rawly. "I sound like an Afterschool Special." Her black pinafore dress was resting next to Duncan's torn jeans at the final wicket, and there was a pause before Duncan changed the subject.

"That was my first game of Strip Croquet, you know. I thank you."

"You're welcome," Courtney chuckled. "It's a lot more fun than just flinging off your clothes and boning away on the neighbour's swing set." Her blue mallet had been staked into the ground, and her blue lace underwear hung on one end, Duncan's white boxers on the other.

"Well, I don't know," Duncan chuckled. "There's something to be said for – ouch!" Courtney pinched him, giggling. They were artfully entangled on the hammock that hung under the willow tree at the end of the garden, with Duncan's gunslinger coat draped over them like a blanket. Courtney reached up and pulled him into a warm kiss, laughing uneasily when it ended.

"What a night," she sighed. Duncan gently kissed her on the neck, and her eyes fluttered shut. "What a life. I almost moved into high school out of the sixth grade, because I was some kinda genius," she murmured, unsure quite why she was confessing this to him. They'd only met less than twelve hours ago, but she already trusted him more than anyone else in her life. "We all decided to chuck the idea because I'd have trouble making friends, blah-blah-blah." Courtney opened her eyes again as Duncan continued to kiss up her neck and moved onto her cheek, but somehow she knew he was listening intently. "Now blah-blah-blah is all I do. I use my grand I.Q. to figure out what gloss to wear and how to hit three keggers before curfew." She laughed bitterly. "Some genius."

Duncan pulled away, staring up the stars contemplatively. "Heather Chandler is one bitch who deserves to die," he said quietly. Courtney shook her head.

"Killing her won't solve anything."

"A well-timed lightning bolt through her window and Monday morning, all her little cronies, shit, everybody would be cast fucking adrift."

Well then, I'll pray for rain," Courtney said flatly, before laughing and pulling him into another kiss. He smiled at her when she pulled away this time.

"I… I guess I don't know what the hell I'm talking about," he laughed quietly, eyes twinkling. Courtney bit her lip with a grin.

"I know exactly what the hell you're talking about," she informed him. "And you're right. You don't know what the hell you're talking about. Let's just grow up, be adults, and die."

Duncan nuzzled her now-messy hair. "Good plan," he chuckled quietly, and Courtney's eyes glittered with mischief.

"But before that," she grinned impishly, "I'd like to see Heather Chandler puke her guts out."


	4. Bleach

Heather Chandler's bedroom was lushly and expensively furnished: a four-poster bed against the back wall, draped in red velvet with pink silk bed-sheets; white lacquered chest-of-drawers, wardrobe, dressing table, and desk-and-chair set; plush red velvet arm chairs against the walls; fluffy pink rugs on the floor; and in the centre, an eyecatching glass coffee table. Heather herself, however, was unable to appreciate her beautiful surroundings due to her pounding headache and churning stomach as she lay sprawled and semi-awake in the centre of her bed, the pink silk twisted artfully around her. Hungover Heather was generally even crabbier than regular Heather, and it showed when her mother called through to her:

"We are leaving for your grandmother's soon, if you care to join us…"

"Bag that," Heather snarled at the closed door.

"Is that a 'No' in your lingo?" Mrs Chandler questioned. Heather raised her right middle finger in the direction of the door.

"Lingo this."

Mr and Mrs Chandler left soon after that, and it was maybe ten minutes before the back door into the kitchen swung open, and two silhouettes crept into the kitchen, bathed in early-morning light.

"Trust me," the shorter figure murmured. "She skips the Saturday morning trip to Grandma's even when she's _not_ hungover."

The taller figure grinned mischievously. "Then let's just concoct ourselves a little hangover cure that'll induce her to spew red, white, and blue."

They were, of course, Courtney and Duncan, sneaking over to exact revenge on Heather for all she'd done to hurt Courtney in the past few years. This would be Courtney's final interaction with her, the bargaining chip that would hopefully prevent Heather from ruining her reputation – or at least, stop the bullying and social isolation that would otherwise follow.

Courtney headed for the fridge, while Duncan began riffling through the cupboard under the sink. He needn't have bothered though, because an idea came to Courtney the second she spied the two cartons in the little door-shelf. "What about orange juice and milk?" she suggested. "What's the upchuck factor on that?"

Duncan stopped his rustling, and held up the bottle he'd found with a wicked grin. "I'm a No Rust Build-Up man, myself."

Courtney narrowed her eyes at the bright blue bottle, and snorted derisively. "Don't be a dick. That stuff'll kill her." Duncan looked up, and they made somewhat-queasy eye-contact. Courtney returned to examining the contents of the fridge, while Duncan amused himself by mixing the various cleaning products under the sink into a glass beer mug. "O-kay…" Courtney hummed, having gone through her options. "How about we cook up some soup and put it in a Coke? That's pretty sick, eh?" She held up two cans with the flair of a game-show presenter. "Now, should it be Chicken-Noodle or Bean-with-Bacon?"

Duncan huffed his green-tipped fringe out of his eyes and held up the glass, which was now filled with strange blue liquid. "Man, Princess, pull the plug on that shit. I say we go with Big Blue here."

Courtney stared at the concoction, eyes roving over the various bottles and tubs Duncan had opened to make it. _Maybe… NO!_ She shook her head, forcing her thoughts away from the tempting… "What are you _doing?_ You can't just go…" She cut herself off, because a very worrying voice in the back of her head had just piped up, _Why not?_ Shaking her head again to clear it, she reverted to her Cafeteria Politician voice. "Besides, she'd never drink anything that looks like that."

Duncan shrugged and reached back up to the cupboard where he'd found the beer glass, pulling down a plain white ceramic mug. "Okay, so we'll use this. She won't know what she's drinking." With an air of suave triumph, he poured the poison into it. Courtney stared at the mug, her mind spinning, before decisively turning back to the fridge and removing the cartons of milk and juice. She stomped over to him and banged them onto the counter.

"Just give me a cup, jerk," she muttered icily, and Duncan sheepishly pulled down a second mug. Courtney snatched it, before filling it halfway with orange juice and topping it up with milk. The white liquid was far less threatening than the other mixture, and Courtney wondered what the result would look like when Heather drank it. Hopefully she'd choke. Maybe spew if they were lucky. Perhaps something was still missing though. "Milk and orange juice," she announced, tilting her head. "Hmmmm. Maybe we could cough a phlegm globber in it or something." Duncan shrug-nodded, and the two of them began coughing harshly and clearing their throats. They stopped after about 20 seconds, though. "No luck?" Courtney muttered, and Duncan shook his head, and she sighed, but finally shrugged. "Well, milk and orange juice will do quite nicely."

Duncan leaned back against the counter. "Chicken."

"You're not funny." Duncan pouted, and stood still, apparently sulking, while Courtney cleared the countertop and shoved the cleaning products back under the sink. She paused to glare at the tempting blue fluid in the mug, but a pair of lips on the back of her neck distracted her.

"I'm sorry," Duncan muttered, wrapping his arms around her waist. Courtney grinned begrudgingly and turned to kiss him back.

"Bonehead."

Their lips met, and for a second, Courtney quite forgot where she was. This was nice. She could stay here for a while… but the prospect of revenge on Heather reminded her to get a move on, and, not looking away from Duncan's charming teal eyes, she reached dreamily for the cup. Her hand made contact with cool porcelain, and she pulled away from him, backing towards the door with a smile.

Duncan grinned back, before glancing down at the cups still on the counter, and his eyes widened. The one still sitting on the pale marble was filled with white liquid. Which meant that the one in Courtney's hand –

"Princess?"

"Hmm?"

He opened his mouth to tell her she'd made a mistake, that she'd grabbed the wrong cup in a moment of distraction – but something (he wasn't sure what) suddenly told him not to, so he shook his head instead.

"Nothing. I'll carry the cup."

Heather was sprawled out in her bed, her dark hair splayed out like a halo and her pink silk duvet barely covering her scant pyjamas. There was something peaceful about her face in this state, the anger and haughtiness dimmed by exhaustion, leaving her looking far younger than usual. Or maybe it was the lack of makeup.

"Morning, Heather," Courtney said.

And like that, the peace was gone. Heather 's eyelids fluttered, and she stretched like a cat before sitting up in bed. She stared coolly at the girl who'd woken her from her slumber, before her eyes travelled over to Courtney's dark-haired companion. "Courtney. And Jesse James. _Quelle surprise._ " She stared at Duncan coldly through her dark lashes. "Hear about Courtney's affection for regurgitation?"

Courtney smiled at Heather. Not her real smile; her politician smile. "We both said a lot of things we didn't mean, last night." She sounded confidently diplomatic, but she was grasping at straws.

Maybe Heather knew that. Maybe she didn't. Either way, her response sent a shiver down Courtney's spine. " _Did_ we?" The queen bee leaned back, flicking her hair out of her face. "How the hell'd you get in here?"

Duncan stepped in, avoiding the question with the skill of someone used to being interviewed. Or interrogated. "Courtney knew you'd have a hangover, so I whipped this up for you," he said, raising his eyebrows and positively milking the charm. "It's a family recipe." He offered her the cup, and Heather snorted.

"Did you put a phlegm globber in it or something?" she scowled. "I'm not drinking that piss."

Duncan shrugged and backed away from the bed. "Eh, this stuff would probably be too intense for you anyway."

Heather laughed, throwing her head back, but there was no humour in her demeanour. "Intense? Grow up. You think I'll drink it just because you call me _chicken?"_ Her voice said 'get real', but the flicker in her grey eyes told Courtney everything she needed to know. She caught Duncan's eye, raising her eyebrows at him, and Duncan caught on, raising his own back and throwing in a half-shrug for good measure. Heather scowled fiercely, and pushed back her covers, getting to her feet and storming over to Duncan. "Just give me the cup, jerk."

Duncan obediently handed her the cup, and Heather tossed her head back as she drained it, as if swallowing a jello-shot. Courtney grinned in anticipation –

But something was wrong. Heather's pale, flawless skin was suddenly ashen. Her eyes were round and confused and _scared._ And her mouth was stained a horribly familiar blue.

Heather grabbed at her throat, gagging. She was hyperventilating. Blue was streaming down her chin, mixing with foamy white spit – and now the terrifying scarlet of blood. Her eyes rolled back in her head, and her mouth worked desperately. "Corn nuts!" she choked out.

Then she fell face forward through the glass coffee table, which smashed into a thousand pieces, and went still.

She was dead.

Duncan's face had turned the same pure white as the wallpaper. "Holy shit," he whispered.

Courtney felt as though she might be sick. "Oh my God," she whispered. "I can't believe it. I just killed my best friend."

"And your worst enemy," Duncan pointed out.

Courtney shook her head. "Same difference." Her head was spinning, and she felt as though she might be sick. "Jésus, I'm gonna…" she sank into the plush red armchair next to the desk.

Duncan choked out a hollow, shocked laugh. "What are we going to tell the cops?" he whispered. "'Fuck it if she can't take a joke, Sarge.'"

"Stop kidding around," Courtney whimpered. "The police… oh no, oh God… I can't believe this is my life. I'm going to have to send my S.A.T. scores to Edmonton instead of McGill."

Duncan sat down heavily on the bed. "I'm just a little freaked, you know," he mumbled. There was silence for a moment, before he added, "At least you got what you wanted."

"Don't say that!" Courtney hissed. "It's one thing to want someone out of your life. It's another thing entirely to serve them a wake-up cup of Liquid Drainer… Don't say…" She trailed off, staring into space, trying to process the situation, while Duncan turned to stare at the bedside table. His eye was caught by the slim yellow and black book at the top of the pile of reading material:

 _ **The Bell Jar**_

Duncan skimmed through his knowledge of the famous Sylvia Plath novel, something beginning to form in his mind, but the idea clicked into place as he caught sight of the headline of the magazine under the book: _**THE FALL OF THE AMERICAN TEEN.**_

"We did a murder…" he murmured, more to himself than to Courtney. She looked around anyway. "In Canada, that's a crime. But… if this was, like… a suicide thing…"

"Like a suicide thing?" Courtney quavered. Duncan nodded.

"Adolescence is a period of life fraught with anxiety and confusion," he quoted, remembering a pamphlet he'd read at a long-ago therapist's office.

Courtney took a deep breath, catching his eye. "I can do Heather's handwriting as well as my own," she offered, and Duncan nodded. Courtney turned and reached for the stationary drawer in the desk, pulling out a notebook and a red pen. She turned to the first page, paused for a moment, and then began scrawling in the looping, elegant script, dictating as she went. " _You might think what I've done is shocking;_ _"_

Duncan took over. " _to me though, suicide is the natural answer to the myriad of problems life has given me._ _"_

Courtney shook her head. "That's good, but Heather would never use the word 'myriad'."

"This is the last thing she'll ever write," Duncan pointed out. "She'll want to cash in on as many fifty-cent words as poss."

"Yeah, but she missed 'myriad' on a vocab test two weeks ago, alright?"

Duncan nodded. "That only proves my point more! The word is a badge for her failures at school."

Courtney nodded slowly. "You're probably right… Okay. _People think just because you're beautiful and popular, life is easy and fun. Nobody understood I had feelings too_ _"_ _._

 _"_ _I die knowing no one knew the real me._

 _\- Heather Chandler_ " Duncan finished. Courtney completed the signature and glanced up at him with an almost-smile.

"That's good," she mumbled. "Have you done this before?" Duncan was silent, and Courtney's smile died as her eyes once again fell on the dead body that still lay silent on top of what used to be the coffee table.

In a place like Muskoka, Ontario, news travels fast no matter how mundane. Of course, a suicide was anything but mundane, especially that of a popular teenage girl, which was why the faculty of Westerburg High found themselves in a staff meeting on Monday morning. Principle Norbert Hatchett sighed and lit his pipe, gazing at his staff over the haze of cigarette smoke that filled the teachers' lounge, before reaffirming his decision against cancelling classes.

"Any other Principle would take the same position," he insisted. "Keep things business as usual."

Counsellor Blaineley O'Halloran leaned forward, flicking the ash off her cigarette into an ashtray. "Heather Chandler's not your everyday suicide, though," she pointed out. "She was _very_ popular."

Hatchett groaned and puffed his pipe. "Come on, Blaineley. I let the kids go before lunch and the switchboard'll light up like a Christmas Tree."

Blaineley raised her eyebrows. "The parents will be sympathetic, Norbert. These are troubled times for the young."

Joshua Pope spoke up. "I must say I was impressed to see that she made proper use of the word 'myriad' in her suicide note after brutalizing it in a vocabulary test," he hummed.

Miles Flemming, spiritualist, eccentricist, and Drama Teacher Extraordinaire, dramatically cut in. "I find it profoundly disturbing that we are told of a tragic destruction of youth and all we can talk about is adequate morning times and misused vocabulary words," she announced, as a collective sigh swept the room, and Norbert Hatchett muttered something unsuitable for use in polite conversation under his breath. Miles ignored all of it, ploughing on. "The school, meaning both students and teachers, must revel in this revealing moment! I suggest we get everyone into the cafeteria and just talk. And feel. Together."

Hatchett pinched the bridge of his nose. "Thank you, Ms Flemming. Call me when the shuttle lands," he snarked, before returning to business. "This girl was one of the popular girls… was she the Head Cheerleader?"

Blaineley shook her head. "That would be Lindsay McNamara. Heather was the leader of her little clique."

Hatchett sighed. "Damn. I'd be willing to go half a day for a cheerleader."

"Let's just pack it in an hour early," Joshua suggested, and Hatchett considered the idea before nodding.

"Done. I hate Mondays."

In spite of Hatchett's refusal of her suggestion to hold a group therapy session in the cafeteria, nothing could stop Miles Flemming once she'd put her mind to something. She couldn't have the whole school, so her second period Drama class of Juniors would have to do. Unfortunately, seventeen-year-olds are difficult to wrangle at the best of times, especially when they're filled with strong emotions, and doubly so when they don't respect the wrangler. Still, she was trying her best.

"I said a circle, you imbeciles!"

Of course, sometimes your best isn't good enough, and Miles Flemming glared out over the chaotic arrangement of chairs and desks put together by her pupils. This would probably be the best she got, though, so she accepted it and moved on. "Forget it! Just sit down." She took a deep breath and gathered herself, before smiling sanctimoniously out at the class. "I'm just so _thrilled,"_ she paused dramatically, "to finally have an example of the profound sensitivity of which a human animal is capable. That example is Heather Chandler. I have… her note!" Miles melodramatically lifted the note into the air, soaking in the gasps of amazement with a satisfied smile. "I'll pass the suicide note around the room so you can all feel its tragic beauty for yourself. Let us share together the feelings the suicide has spurred in us all. Who wants to begin?"

A girl with frizzy red hair, sporting an army jacket and a dull, hazy look in her eyes, raised her hand, and Miles nodded at her. "Yes?"

"I heard it was really gnarly," the girl grinned. "She sucked down a bowl of multi-purpose deodorizing disinfectant and then smashed-"

"Now, now, Izzy, let's not rehash the coroner's report," Miles tutted. "Let's talk _emotions."_

Cody Anderson raised his hand, and Miles pointed hopefully at him. "Um," he began. His voice sounded hesitant, but became more confident as he continued. "Heather and I used to go out, but she said I was boring. I realise now that I wasn't really boring. She was just dissatisfied with her life."

Miles beamed. "That's very good, Cody."

At the back of the classroom, Courtney snorted a laugh, but as the class turned to stare at her, she hurriedly covered her face with her hands and pretended it was a sob. Miles gave her a pitying look.

"Dear Courtney, Heather was your soulmate….. Share."

Courtney sighed, leaning back in her chair. "Heather was cool, but cruel," she chose her words carefully. "The good looks and bad manners gave her power, but they could not give her happiness." Several jaws dropped, and Courtney winced as the girl next to her handed her the suicide note. Her excellent penmanship winced back, and she hurriedly passed it on before continuing. "She realized the only way she could be happy was to give up her power. And the only way she could do that was Death." As the students continued to stare at her, she awkwardly folded in on herself. Luckily, Miles' attention was caught by a nerdy-looking boy raising his hand.

"Are we going to be tested on this?"

Courtney drifted through the rest of the class and into her next one in a trance. Her ability to create truths for a captive audience made her feel queasy, and she didn't pay attention to anything until the end of her PE class at the end of the day. They were in the changing room, and Lindsay was clipping on her gold hoop earrings while Courtney leaned against the lockers staring into space and Gwen scarfed down a bucket of chicken wings. Lindsay fixed her earrings in place before whining loudly.

"God, it's so unfair. It's just so _unfair!_ We should get a whole week off, not just an hour!"

Gwen continued gnawing on a chicken wing. "Write the School Board," she suggested around it, and Courtney raised an eyebrow.

"Watch it, Gwen. You could actually be digesting food," she snarked, but secretly she was relieved. She hadn't seen Gwen eat this much since Freshman Year.

"Yeah, where's your urge to purge?" Lindsay sniffed. Gwen burped loudly and unashamedly.

"Fuck it." She flung the finished chicken wing over her shoulder, where it hit a sophomore squarely in the nose before plopping to the floor with a squelch. Courtney wrinkled her nose, but didn't comment, and Lindsay absently swung open the little jewellery locker that had belonged to Heather. Suddenly her eyes widened, and she reached in and pulled out a red-and-blue watch.

"Hey, Heather left behind one of her Swatches!" She considered it, tilting her head, before tossing it to Courtney, who caught it with a spooked expression. "She'd want you to have it, Courtney. She always said you couldn't accessorise for shit."

Courtney silently clipped the watch onto her wrist. Its weight felt like a twisted kind of trophy. She was distracted by the girl with frizzy red hair approaching her; the same girl who'd 'rehashed the coroner's report' that morning.

"I'm sorry about your friend," she said dreamily, and Courtney noticed the unfocussed gaze behind her sunglasses and realized the girl was probably higher than the Empire State Building. "I thought she was just your usual airhead bitch. Guess I was wrong. Lot of us were." She drifted off, and Courtney turned back to Gwen and Lindsay. Gwen had since acquired the largest Sno-cone Courtney had ever seen, and tutted as Izzy wandered away.

"What a waste," she sighed. "Oh the Humanity." Gwen immediately tucked in, and Courtney turned slowly on her heel. She needed something to slap her awake, out of this nightmare, this odd dystopian world she'd somehow landed in. The showers caught her eye, and she walked towards them like a zombie, reaching out and pushing the button. Cold water sprayed against her neat black dress, soaking her blue socks and flattening her hair against her head.

"Courtney? What are you doing?" Lindsay's voice echoed into the shower room, but Courtney ignored her. _Wake up. Everything will be back to normal if you can wake up from this nightmare._

Lindsay glared at Courtney as they left through the side-door of the building with Gwen. "That was seriously warped, Courtney," she said disapprovingly. Courtney shrugged, tugging her jacket on over her soaked clothes.

"Uh-huh."

In her peripheral vision, she saw Gwen's eyes widen excitedly. "TV Cameras!" the green-clad girl gasped. Courtney followed her gaze, and indeed, a TV camera crew had set up on the main steps and was interviewing students about the suicide. Before Courtney could even find it in herself to be disgusted, Gwen was dashing towards them. Lindsay _hmm_ ed and fluffed her hair, before following. Courtney looked away, and her eyes were drawn to the soaked, stopped Swatch on her wrist. She hurried to unclip it and drop it in a trashcan.

 **"** **I choose to remember the good times,"** Gwen was saying into a microphone. **"Like when we got our ears pierced at the mall…"** Her pale, smug face was replaced with Lindsay's calmer, more melancholy expression.

 **"** **I can still hear those late-night talks on the phone,"** she said, and her face was replaced with Cody's.

 **"** **The day I won her that stuffed rhino at the 4-H fair, she said to me –"**

"You're an asshole!" Courtney yelled at the TV. "Mute him!" Duncan obediently pressed the mute button on the remote, and Cody's voice was cut off.

"Mute!" Duncan chuckled. He and Courtney were lounging on the couch in his otherwise sparsely furnished living room, glaring at the TV. Courtney leaned her head on his shoulder.

"Next channel, darling."

Duncan changed the channel, but he may as well not have bothered. Gwen Duke's face popped back up on the screen, this time sitting on a staircase. Courtney's jaw dropped.

" _Jésus,_ Gwen, how many networks did you run to?!" Gwen's face was replaced with Staci's, and Courtney snorted, grabbing the remote. "Oh, I have to hear this."

Staci was clad in a Drama Brothers T-shirt. Her bob was still stiff around her face, and a look of insincerity was clogging her pores. **"In my heart, Heather's still alive,"** she was saying, but Courtney interrupted her.

"What are you talking about?" she snorted, pressing mute again. "She hated you! You hated her!" Courtney's eyes flicked over to Duncan, and she noticed his bemused grin. "What are you smiling at?"

Duncan shook his head, still grinning. "Heather Chandler is more popular than ever now," he chuckled. Courtney blew her bangs out of her eyes.

"Yeah. Scary stuff."

Just then, Duncan glanced over her shoulder, his grin being replaced with a mischievous half-smile. For some inexplicable reason, he chose that moment to call out, "Why son, I didn't hear you come in."

Courtney turned, and laid eyes upon a man who could only be Duncan's father. He had the same chiselled jawline, the same dark hair, and the same snub nose. His eyes were a cold grey, though. There was something in them that made Courtney shiver.

"Hey Dad, who was work today?" the man said. He wore a smart suit, but he loosened his tie, flinging it over his shoulder as he approached the treadmill next to the couch. It was the only other piece of furniture in the room, apart from a rack of weights in the corner. Duncan's father stepped onto the treadmill, pressed the on button, and began speedwalking. _The Brady Bunch_ was now playing on the TV, adding another odd juxtaposition to a room already full of them. "It was miserable," he harrumphed. "Some damn tribe of withered old bitches doesn't want us to terminate that fleabag hotel. All because Glenn Miller and his band once took a shit there. It's just like Alaska." He raised his chin in Duncan's direction. "Do you remember fucking Alaska?"

"That was the one with the snowstorm, right?" Duncan chuckled, but his laugh didn't reach his eyes.

His father laughed too, but this laugh was cold in an entirely different way. "The **Save The Memorial Oak Tree Society**. Showed those fucks."

Duncan turned back to Courtney to explain, wearing a bemused smile. "Thirty Canada Day fireworks attached to the trunk. Arraigned but Acquitted."

"Fucking USA," his father snorted. His eyes turned to Courtney, who bounced her foot awkwardly. "Gosh Pop, I almost forgot to introduce my girlfriend."

"Dad, this is Courtney," Duncan said, sounding as awkward as Courtney felt. "Courtney, this is my father, Big Bud Dean."

"Hello," Courtney smiled, getting up and offering a handshake. Big Bud removed one of his hands from the bar on the treadmill and twitched it in greeting, and Courtney awkwardly withdrew her hand, sitting back down.

"Duncan," Duncan said, and Big Bud turned to him. "Why don't you ask your little friend to stay for dinner?"

While it was sweet of him to want her to stay, Courtney would have rather watched a thousand of Gwen's interviews about Heather. She stood back up, gathering her coat and purse. "My Mom's making my favourite meal tonight," she awkwardly excused herself. "Spaghetti. Lots of oregano."

"Nice!" Duncan said faux-cheerfully, glancing at his father. "The last time I saw my Mom, she was waving out of the window of a library in Trout River. Right, _Dad?"_

Big Bud didn't stop pacing along the treadmill, but he grinned back at Duncan. It wasn't a nice grin. It was a You-Think-You're-Tougher-Than-Me-But-You're-Not grin. "Right. _Son,"_ he said coolly. Courtney grimaced.

"O-kay, then. I'll see you later," she told Duncan, before hurrying out of the house.

Her own parents were out on the patio when she arrived home, a plate of pâté on the table and a slight scent of the past lingering in the air. Courtney could almost see the ghosts of herself and her friends playing croquet on the lawn… Heather Chandler hitting the ball… turning… gagging… drooling… bleeding… _dying…_

Her father's voice snapped her out of it. "Take a break, Courtney, sit down." Courtney obediently sat in the empty chair.

"All right." Her father was fumbling with a lighter, and he succeeded in lighting his cigarette before turning to her.

"So, what was the first day after Heather's suicide like?"

Courtney winced internally, but on the outside, she shrugged, feigning numbness. With a twist of guilt, she realised she wasn't really feigning much. "I don't know," she said, once again choosing her words carefully. "It was okay, I guess."

Her mother tutted. "Terrible thing," she sighed, before hurriedly changing the subject. "So, will we get to meet this Dark Horse prom contender?"

Courtney had never been so grateful to her mother in her life. "May _be_ ," she hummed, finally cracking a proper smile.

Her father, not paying attention, sighed at the cigarette burning down between his fingers. "Goddamn. Will somebody please tell me why I smoke these damn things?"

Courtney giggled. "Because you're an idiot."

"Oh yeah, that's it." He immediately took another drag, grinning widely, and Mrs Sawyer shook her head fondly.

"You two…" she sighed, popping a piece of pâté into her mouth and swallowing without chewing. Courtney got to her feet to head back inside.

"Great pâté, Mom, but I'm going to have to motor if I want to be ready for the funeral tomorrow."


	5. Funeral

The day of the funeral dawned warm and bright, giving the whole affair a surreal feeling. In her room, Lindsay McNamara modelled an all-black outfit in front of her mirror, but stormed away pouting when she noticed her boots were a slightly different shade of black to her dress. A few streets away, Gwen Duke glanced at a magazine article titled _Funeral Chic_ as she carefully applied black lipstick, but as she glanced in the mirror, her eyes widened, and she hurriedly reached for a cotton pad to scrub violently at her lips. Even with Heather dead, Gwen could still feel her disapproval.

Heather herself lay in an open coffin at the church. Her parents had decided on an open casket, and a mortician carefully smoothed her white dress and buffed her pristine forehead. Even though her lips were still tinged blue through the carefully applied lipstick, she was still beautiful in an otherworldly way. The mortician leaned down and kissed her forehead, before hurriedly buffing it again. Her parents had requested she wear her favourite red scrunchie, but it had strangely enough been nowhere to be found.

Lindsay modelled another black outfit in front of her mirror, satisfied that it matched her boots. Gwen finished her make-up - more traditional this time - and clipped a crucifix-shaped earring to one earlobe with a smile. Courtney pulled her navy overcoat over her black dress and straightened her matching hat.

They were ready for the funeral.

"Death!" Father Ripper boomed. "Death is coming. Death is here. Who is that knocking at the door? It's death." Courtney bounced her leg awkwardly, not knowing how anyone was expected to respond to this. It was disconcerting enough to be attending the funeral of a girl you had accidentally murdered, but doubly twitch-inducing to be reminded of the exact events every five seconds. "I blame not Heather," the priest continued, "but a society that tells its teenagers that the answers can be found in the MTV video games. We must pray that the other teenagers of Muskoka, Ontario, know the name of that 'righteous dude' who can solve their problems… It's Jesus Christ, and he's in the book."

After the service, Zoey Finn approached the coffin and knelt next to it. _May Heather Chandler rest in peace even though she committed suicide,_ she prayed. _For-the-glory-the-power-and-the-kingdom-are-yours-now-and-forever-Amen._ She made the sign of the cross and rose, allowing Lindsay to take her place.

Lindsay's prayer was a little less conventional. _Oh, God, this is a tragic thing and sometimes I have a hard time dealing with it. Please send Heather to Heaven and stuff._

Cody was next, looking paler and twitchier than usual. _Dear God,_ he prayed, _please make sure this never happens to me because I do not think I could handle suicide, and that's the God's honest truth._ He cracked a strained grin. _Pardon the pun. Fast-early-acceptance-into-an-Ivy-League-school-and-please-let-it-be-Harvard. Amen._ Cody stood and fled, and Brady uncomfortably took his place.

 _Jesus God in heaven… man, why'd you have to kill such hot snatch? …It's a joke, man. Jeez, people are so serious._ He looked around awkwardly before finishing. _Hail Mary, who art in Heaven, and pray for all the sinners… that we don't get caught. Another joke, man!_

He clumsily got up, and Gwen took his place. Although she hadn't yet been able to allow herself to dress how she wanted to, she felt oddly liberated following her former leader's death, and it showed in her prayer. _I prayed for the death of Heather Chandler many times, and I felt bad every time I did it, but I kept doing it anyway._ A shadow of guilt passed across her face, before a slow smile replaced it, and she took a deep breath, forcing herself not to shriek with glee. _Now I know that you understood everything. Praise Jesus. Alleluia._

Gwen adjusted her wide black sunhat, pulled up her black satin gloves, and straightened the hem of her black sundress - she seemed to Courtney, now approaching the coffin, to be dressed more for a Gothic cruise than a funeral. Courtney knelt down in Gwen's place and gnawed at her lip.

 _Hi,_ she began. _I'm sorry._ _Technically_ _I did not kill Heather Chandler… but, hey, who am I trying to kid, right? I just want my high school to be a nice place. Amen. …Did that sound bitchy?_

She got up and headed towards the exit of the church, passing the bowl of Holy Water, into which Lindsay was currently surreptitiously dipping a big comb and using it to re-fluff her perm. The blonde caught up to her as she left, with a cry of "Hey, Courtney!" Courtney stopped to allow Lindsay's shorter legs to catch up with her, and they fell into step together. "What are you doing tonight?"

Courtney shrugged. "I dunno. Mourning. Maybe watch some TV. Why?"

Lindsay coiled a blonde curl around her index finger. "Well, Brady asked me out tonight, but he wants to double with Scott and Scott doesn't have a date."

Courtney winced, remembering her last double-date with Scott, Brady and Lindsay. It had not been a pleasant experience. "Lindsay, I've got something going with Duncan." _Please respect that I never want to go out with Scott again._

"Please, Court," Lindsay gazed at her with big blue puppy-dog eyes. "Put Billy The Kid on hold tonight. I'll never forget it."

Scott and Brady were standing a little way off from the church doors in the parking lot, next to Scott's battered pick-up truck. "So man, we on tonight?" Scott was asking Brady, who shrugged.

"Dunno… still gotta talk to Lindsay." Harold and his pudgy friend Sam stepped by, Sam accidentally treading on one of Scott's feet. Scott's jaw dropped in annoyance.

"That little pudwapper just stepped on my foot."

Brady clenched his teeth with a snarl. "Let's kick his ass!" He made to start forwards, but Scott held him back.

"Cool off, we're seniors."

"Brady nodded, leaning back against the truck door. "Goddamn geek!" he called after the two boys.

Sam and Harold turned to face the two alpha jocks, looking far more confidant than they should have. Sam raised his middle finger, with an awkwardly defiant smirk. "Yeah, well, sit and spin!"

Scott met Brady's eyes, both of them more amused than angered. "That little prick," he chuckled, before both boys leapt towards Sam, who fled in the direction of the little fountain on the church lawn. Brady followed Sam round the fountain while Scott cut off his escape route, and Brady moved in for the kill, shoving Sam's face into the dirt and sitting on his back. Scott bent down with a grin while Harold looked on in shame.

"Alright, you piece of shit fag," Scott smirked, "do you like to suck big dicks?"

"Cut it out," Sam moaned. Brady pushed him down harder.

"Say it, man," Scott grinned. "Say 'I like to suck big dicks'."

"L-leave him alone, Scott," Harold stuttered, but Scott ignored him. His attention was caught by Duncan, riding past on his motorcycle and wearing a helmet that read **THE TRUE KILLER** across the top. He shivered a little, distracted, and Brady took over the intimidation.

"Say it!"

"Okay, okay!" Sam said. He paused, then grinned defiantly again. "You like to suck big dicks."

Unamused, Brady shoved his face into the dirt, and Sam sobbed a little. "I like to suck big dicks!" he whimpered. "Mmmm- _mm!_ I can't get enough of them! Satisfied?"

Scott shook himself and looked confident once again. "I'm sure your friends are happy to hear that. Right, guy- _th_?" He mimicked a nerdy lisp, and Harold and the other geeks who had gathered to watch stared at the floor in shame.

Elsewhere, Courtney and Lindsay continued to sashay through the parking lot. Lindsay was still trying to convince Courtney to go with her on the date. "Come on, Brady's been so sweet lately, consoling me and stuff. It'll be really very. Promise."

"I dunno…"

"Courtney, please, I'm asking you as your best friend."

"All _right_ ," Courtney sighed. "But this better not be one of those nights where they get shitfaced and take us to a pasture to tip cows."

The cow was fast asleep, standing up. Scott and Brady were giggling, drunk, and clinging to each other as they scrambled around it. Courtney and Lindsay looked on from about ten feet away, uncomfortably sober.

"Is it sleeping, dude?" Scott giggled.

"I think so, man," Brady replied, slurring a little.

"Then get over on this side. Oh shit, cow-tipping is the fucking greatest!"

"Punch it in!" The two boys made to slam their knuckles together but missed, toppling into each other. Lindsay gave Courtney an apologetic smile, but Courtney glared it away.

"Count of three. One… two… three!"

Courtney closed her eyes at the sound of the startled moo, and grimaced as she felt mud splash her face, hair and outfit. She turned to Lindsay with a reproachful scowl, and the cheerleader looked as mortified as she did.

Half an hour later, Courtney had had enough. It was time to blow this joint. She made her way up the hill towards the fence, Scott stumbling after her and singing an off-key version of a Marvin Gaye song. It would be intimidating for most girls, having a drunk, horny football player following them in the dark, but Courtney was more annoyed than anything else - not for lack of knowledge or experience, but because Scott was way more bark than bite at this point.

"When I get that feelin', I _neeeeeeed_ sexual healing!"

"Yeah right, asshole," Courtney muttered. She was over the fence and a good distance away from it at this point, while Scott was still trying to remember how his legs worked. She paused at the top of the incline to stare sadly back at where Lindsay was lying dispiritedly under Brady as he yanked at her clothes. Courtney turned back towards the road, and to her surprise, there, leaning against his motorbike with his coat blowing majestically around him, was her dark knight in shining armour.

Duncan blew out a thin stream of smoke before crushing his cigarette into the dirt with his converse. "What is this shit?"

Courtney wrinkled her nose as a splash behind her told her that Scott had lost the fight with gravity and fallen off the fence. Judging from the lack of follow-up activity, he'd apparently decided his best bet was to lie face down in the mud for the time-being. "I'm doing a favour for Lindsay. Double date. I was going to tell you at the funeral, but you'd rode off."

"Feel like making bah-da-dah-bah-da-dah, feel like making love." Scott continued to sing, now sounding slightly muffled.

Duncan shook his head, chuckling out a harsh laugh. "Another fucking queenie." He shook his head with a smile. "Sorry, I'm just feeling kind of superior tonight. Seven different high schools in seven different provinces, and the only thing different is my locker combination. We've broken through the peer pressure cooker. So what if we had to kill Miss Popularity…"

"So what? Don't smile like that, Jésus!"

Duncan offered her a hand, now looking deadly serious. "Our love is God. Let's go get a Slushie." Courtney took his hand with a grin, forcing herself to ignore Lindsay's whimpers, Brady's grunts, and Scott's muffled warbling.

"And she's buying the stairway to heaven…"


	6. Rumour

"I'm not belittling the Foodless Fund, Cody, but we're talking Teen Suicide!" It was the period before lunch the day after the funeral, and Noah Dawson and Leshawna McMahon were conferring over a yearbook while Cody Anderson pouted behind them. Leshawna wasn't really listening, plugged into her Walkman, but Noah was currently explaining to Cody why they had rearranged the contents of the yearbook that morning. "Ask Leshawna here, the number one song right now is "Teenage Suicide (Don't Do It)" by The Drama Brothers." He pointed to Leshawna's T-shirt, which displayed a picture of The Drama Brothers' logo, and her headphones, which broadcast a tinny crash of drums and guitars as background music. "Jesus man, Westerburg finally got one of these things and I'm not going to blow it."

"Great. So Heather gets the headline and I get crammed in by the Taco Bell coupon."

Courtney breezed in, today dressed in a fetching blue pinstriped shirt, a tight grey waistcoat, black leggings and flats, and a black bowler hat with a blue scarf tied stylishly over the hatband. "Hi guys," she smiled. "I came to check on the topic for this week's lunchtime poll."

Noah suddenly looked very awkward. "Uh, don't worry about it, Courtney, sit down." He put an arm around her shoulders and guided her to a chair. "That funeral yesterday must have been really rough."

Courtney blinked. "Oh. Sure."

Noah squirmed a little before seemingly coming to a decision. "We were, uh, wondering if maybe you had some poems or artwork that Heather did that we could put in the Heather Chandler yearbook spread."

Courtney blinked again, this time in shock rather than confusion. "The what?"

"Take a look." Noah pulled the draft copy of the yearbook towards her and pointed to the pages it was open at: a selection of photographs of Heather Chandler, all in different outfits accented with her signature red, sometimes wearing a hat or sunglasses, all wearing the same demure-yet-deadly smile. It wasn't that hard for Courtney to picture her with blue poison running down her chin, gagging for help… "We'll have a two page spread, with her suicide note up here in the right hand corner." Noah's voice snapped her out of her hallucination, and she looked up at him blankly. He seemed to take her reaction as disapproving, and tacked on, "It's more tasteful than it sounds."

The door swung open, and Staci entered the room, arm linked with a blonde girl with a similarly self-satisfied expression. They were whispering to each other and giggling madly. Courtney shook her head, ignoring them. "I don't know, Noah. This whole thing leaves a bad taste in my mouth."

"Like last night, Courtney?" Staci tittered, before shrieking with laughter again.

Courtney swivelled in her chair, fixing Staci and her friend with the cold glare she usually reserved for jocks hitting on her. "I'm sorry? I don't get it." Her tone should have been enough of a warning, but the girls ignored her.

"You did last night," Staci's friend gasped, wheezing. "Scott told us all about your little date."

"Yeah, and? I left him drunk and flailing in cow shit."

"I dunno," Staci smirked. "He was really… __detailed.__ "

"Shut up, Staci," Cody said coldly, but Courtney shook her head, anger beginning to blaze in her dark eyes.

"No, don't shut up. I'd like to know exactly what I did."

Cody put a hand on her shoulder. "Come on, Courtney. I'll show you the lunchtime poll." She got to her feet, still glaring at Staci and her friend, as Cody guided her out of the room. He shut the door as soon as they were through it, and turned to her with an apologetic look on his face. "Look, I rarely listen to Neanderthals like Scott Kelly, bu-ut he's been telling everyone that last night he and Brady had a nice little sword-fight in your mouth and afterwards you were bent over like a coffee table with Scott going in one end and Brady coming in the other. Pardon the pun."

Courtney's face went blank. "Pardon the pun. That son of a bitch," she muttered. In a daze, she pulled a clump of dollar bills and handed them to Cody. "Here, Cody, for the Foodless Fund." Cody cheerfully pocketed the bills, and Courtney drifted off down the corridor, face still eerily expressionless.

That evening, Courtney lay back on her bed, grinning as she spoke seductively into her phone. "Hi, Scott? This is Courtney Sawyer… I didn't expect to be calling either. I guess my emotions took over. I was wondering if you wanted all those things you've been saying to really happen. It's always been a fantasy of mine to have two guys at once… Sure, you can write Penthouse Forum." She looked up and shushed Duncan with a grin. He was lounging at the other end of her bed sniggering in delight at the plan they'd cooked up following Scott's disgusting rumour.

"That's right," Courtney continued. "In the woods behind the school, at dawn. And Scott? Don't forget Brady."

She slammed the phone down. At the other end, Scott put down his phone and shook his head with an amazed expression on his face. "Women," he murmured.

With the phone call out of the way, Courtney and Duncan were carefully loading two handguns that Duncan had produced with a grin. Courtney suddenly giggled in incredulity. "I don't see the point of me writing a fake suicide note when we'll just be shooting them with blanks."

Duncan snorted. "Get crucial. We won't be using blanks this time."

Courtney dropped her gun in revulsion. "You can't be serious? Hey, listen, my Bonnie and Clyde days are over." She made to angrily launch off her bed, but Duncan pulled her back down with an easy smile.

"Do you take German?" he asked.

Courtney shook her head coldly. "Spanish."

Duncan nodded, still smiling, and held up a bullet. "These are __Ich Luge__ bullets. My grandfather snared a shitload of them in W.W. Two. They're like tranquillizers only they break the surface of the skin, enough to cause blood, but not any real harm."

Courtney nodded slowly. "So it looks like the person has been shot and killed, when really they're just unconscious and bleeding?" That could work.

Duncan's smile widened. "We shoot Scott and Brady. Make it look like they shot each other. By the time Scott and Brady regain consciousness, they'll be the laughingstocks of the school. The note's the punchline. How'd it turn out?"

Courtney grinned, perhaps picking up on his mood. She grabbed her purse and rummaged for the crumpled biology notes Heather had snagged from Brady so long ago, along with a newer, cleaner note, and held them up for Duncan's inspection. "First tell me the similarity is not incredible."

Duncan squinted at the two notes and nodded. "Incredible similarity," he said warmly. Courtney grinned and flourished the new note, clearing her throat.

"Scott and I died the day we realized we could never reveal our forbidden love to an uncaring and ununderstanding world. The joy we shared in each other's arms was greater than any touchdown. Yet we were forced to live the lie of Sexist-Beer Guzzling-Jock-Assholes.'"

Duncan lounged back on the bed. "Exquisite, but I don't think 'ununderstanding' is a word."

"We don't want to make them out to be too secretly eloquent," Courtney reminded him. She paused, considering something else. "Why would the Germans invent a bullet that doesn't kill people?" she asked, frowning. "I mean, it was World War Two, not a school play."

"They used them on themselves to make it look like they were dead when the Russians invaded Berlin," Duncan said rapidly. "Really quite a brilliant device, but to flamboyant to seriously produce."

"Neat," Courtney grinned. She caught sight of Brittany the raccoon-striped cat entering the room, and aimed her gun at her with a grin. "Let's try it out on Brittany."

Duncan snatched the gun away from her, looking panicked. "It doesn't work on small animals!"

"Oh."

"Well, uh, hey, let's look at the homosexual artefacts I dug up to plant at the scene," Duncan suggested. "Prepare to be a little disappointed." He grabbed a pink glittery shopping bag from beside the bed and dumped the contents out onto the bed. "We've got an issue of __Stud Puppy,__ a candy dish, a Joan Crawford postcard, some mascara…"

Courtney giggled. "You must have had fun."

Duncan clicked his tongue and winked at her. "You know it. Oh, man, I almost forgot… The one perfecto thing I picked up…" He reached for his coat, which was draped over Courtney's desk chair, and pulled from the pockets two bottles of Perrier water. "Ta-da!"

"Oh come on," Courtney rolled her eyes. "Lots of people drink Perrier. It's come a long way."

"This is Muskoka," Duncan pointed out. "If you don't have a brewsky in your hand, you might as well be wearing a dress."

Courtney conceded, before leaning back mock-seductively. "Oh, you're so smart. How about a little heterosexuality before we go?" Duncan laughed, climbing on top of her, and she pulled him in for a warm kiss.

As dawn rose over Muskoka, Scott and Brady walked through the woods behind the school. Brady was in an excitable state, playing air-guitar and singing off-key, but Scott seemed tense, staring straight ahead.

" _ _Sex and Drugs and HBO is all I ever need! Whoa! Can you hear me! Hello Tokyo! I said Sex and Drugs and…__ "

"Shut the fuck up, all right," Scott snapped. Brady made a face.

"Lighten up, dude. In these woods is some of the finest pussy in the school and we don't even have to buy it a hamburger and a Diet Coke. What a way to start the day! Punch it in!" Scott feebly slammed his knuckles against Brady's, but his heart wasn't in it.

Meanwhile, Courtney was tucking her gun into the waistband of her frilly blue skirt. She'd just hidden the bulge under her baggy white cardigan when the crunch of leaves underfoot alerted her to the boys' presence. Everything was prepared.

It was time.

"Hi, Courtney," Scott said. Courtney smiled, forcing cheerfulness.

"Hi guys. Glad you could make it."

Brady clapped his hands together awkwardly. "So, do we just whip it out or what?"

Courtney shook her head, holding down vomit. "I've made a circle at each end of the clearing. Brady, you go over there. Scott, in that one. When you reach the circle, strip."

Brady and Scott gave each other confused looks, but both shrugged and moved to the set-out circles and began removing their shirts. Brady threw his polo-shirt onto the ground before squinting at her.

"Hey, what about you?"

Courtney grinned seductively, picturing that she was talking to Duncan. "I was hoping you'd rip my clothes off me, sport."

"Oh. Good idea."

Both boys finished stripping, standing facing her in their undies. Courtney took a deep breath. "Count of three, guys." Brady giggled in anticipation. "One…" Scott finally cracked a smile. "Two…"

"Three." Duncan stepped out from behind a tree. He and Courtney pulled out their guns, and Duncan aimed at Brady and Courtney aimed at Scott, and they both pulled the triggers.


	7. Gunshots

Duncan's bullet hit Brady squarely in the forehead, and the linebacker collapsed backwards like a marionette whose strings had been cut. Courtney's bullet skimmed Scott's bicep, leaving a shallow red cut, and buried itself in a tree. Scott screamed and turned tail, dashing away down the path, and Courtney threw down her gun with an amused smile.

"Shucks," she said cheerfully. Duncan turned to her with wide eyes, pale with horror.

"Did you miss him _completely_?!"

"Yeah," Courtney giggled. "But don't worry, it was worth it just to see the look on –"

"Don't move!" Duncan shouted. "I'll get him back!" Courtney's laughter cut off like a faucet as he bolted into the woods after Scott, and she stared after him, trembling and feeling horribly, terrifyingly confused.

As Scott ran down the path, Duncan wove through the trees and fog to the side of the path with a cold efficiency. The quarterback was panicked and unsure of where he was going, hoping the path would lead him out, but Duncan knew exactly where Scott was hoping to go, and how to get there quicker.

In the clearing, Courtney turned towards the jock's prone body. Nervously she picked up her gun, running her fingertip lightly over the chamber, and drifted towards where Brady lay, apparently unconscious.

Scott saw the end of the path, and with it the end of the trees. He sped up, but a second later Duncan came hurtling down an incline and shot at the ground in front of the exit. Scott turned and dashed back down the path, looking paler than ever.

Courtney shivered as she knelt next to Brady. He didn't look bleeding and unconscious as Duncan had described. He looked bleeding and dead, dead, _dead._

Scott barrelled into the clearing, looking terrified, and Duncan howled from somewhere in the woods, "NOW!"

In a burst of frightened, animal instinct, Courtney whipped around and fired her gun right into Scott's chest.

At this time in the morning in the parking lot of Westerburg High, a squad car was the only vehicle visible – and this one was filled with marijuana smoke. Two cops sat lazily back in their seats, but suddenly one started coughing, and a second later shouted, "I heard it that time!"

"Wha?" his partner mumbled.

"Another gunshot! From the woods!" His partner struggled upright.

"Shit, let's roll!" The two officers exploded out of the car, running as quickly as they could towards the woods.

Duncan carefully placed his gun in Scott's right hand, while Courtney zombiesquely did the same with Brady and her own gun. "They don't look so good," she said quietly.

Duncan ignored her. "Remember, Brady is left-handed." Courtney picked up the gun and switched it to Brady's left hand, and at that moment, there was a shout from somewhere in the woods.

"Keep going until you hit the clearing!"

Duncan's head snapped up, and he yanked Courtney to her feet. _"Run!"_ he whispered. The two took off into the woods in the opposite direction of the shout, making it out of sight seconds before the two cops charged into the clearing with their guns raised. The cops skidded to a halt as they saw the bodies.

"Mother of Shit!" one whispered.

"Call in," the other one instructed. He glanced up at the spot where Courtney and Duncan had vanished. "I heard something out there. I'm checking it out." He ran through the trees as his partner grabbed his walkie-talkie, holding Scott's non-existent pulse.

"This is Officer McGillis and I've got two dead bodies in the woods behind Westerburg high. Oh my God, one of them's Scott Kelly, the quarterback."

Duncan and Courtney flew through the thick trees as fast as they could. Somewhere above them an owl hooted as something else blindly barrelled through the fog behind them. The exit was right up ahead, and they shot through it, racing down the dew-drenched hill towards Courtney's station-wagon, parked at the bottom. _"Faster!"_ Duncan hissed. They reached the car, panting, and flung open the doors, getting in and slamming them shut. As a police officer came racing out of the woods, they somersaulted into the backseat and began hurriedly stripping down to their underwear. They embraced as the cop stumbled down the hill.

The officer approached the car and peered in. His walkie-talkie crackled, making him jump, and he moved away from the car and spoke into it. "Think what I heard was just a stinking owl. All I got is two kids making out in the backseat of a car. Should I pry them apart?"

"Forget it," came the reply. "I got all the answers back here, partner. Boy, kids today sure start in early. …Hey, are they naked?"

He clicked off his walkie-talkie with a sigh, heading back up the hill.

As the cop moved back into the woods, Courtney and Duncan stopped kissing. They caught their breath, smiled victoriously, then leaned back in with renewed passion.

The officer ran back into the clearing, where his partner was knelt next to the two bodies. "What's the deal?"

"Suicide," McGillis replied. "Double suicide. They shot each other."

"That's Scott Kelly!"

"Yeah, and the linebacker, Brady Sweeney."

"Oh my God, suicide?" He paused, shaking his head. "Why?"

"Does this answer your question?" McGillis said grimly. He reached into the pink, glittery shopping bag lying next to the boys and pulled out two bottles of Perrier water.

His partner's eyes widened. "Oh, man. They were fags!"

McGillis held up a note. "Listen up. 'We could never reveal our forbidden love to an uncaring and ununderstanding world.'"

"Ah. Jesus H Fuck. Scott was a Wawanakwa Sunday Insert Honourable Mention…" he shook his head slowly, but then suddenly frowned in confusion. "Wait a second. How did they shoot each other if we heard two separate sets of gunshots?"

McGillis shrugged and clapped him reassuringly on the shoulder. "I always hear gunshots when I'm high before noon. Life's a crazy bitch. Don't try to analyse it. The quarterback buggering the linebacker. What a waste."

His partner nodded as he processed it. "Oh the humanity."

At the second morning mourning conference of the week, Coach Donovan Ripper tutted a little as he spoke to Counsellor O'Halloran. "After every touchdown they gave each other a little slap on the bottom. It seemed innocent…"

Miles Flemming looked up with a glare. "Shut up."

Joshua Pope shook his head at the suicide note. "Look at this," he sighed. "'Ununderstanding'."

Miles leapt to her feet. "Will you shut up! We were in a similar position on Monday and I thoughtfully suggested that we get the students together for an unadulterated emotional outpouring. You took the opportunity to play yet another round of 'Let's laugh at the Hippie'."

Counsellor O'Halloran raised her eyebrows. "Laurie, if you want to try out for the school play…"

Principal Hatchett hoarsely interrupted her. "Shut up, Blaineley. I've seen a lot of bullshit – angel dust, switchblades, sexually perverse photography exhibits involving tennis racquets, but this suicide thing… I guess it's all on Miles' wavelength. We're just going to have to write off today, and Friday she can do her little love-in or whatever. Whatever."

Courtney's car was the lone vehicle in the student parking lot, and she and Duncan lay in the backseat, both fast asleep. As the obnoxious muffler on a pickup truck filled with Heavy Metalers rumbled into the spot next to them, Courtney's eyes snapped open, and she sat up in a bug-eyed sweat. Groaning, she climbed into the front seat and pulled on her cardigan, pressing in the car's cigarette lighter for it to warm up. As more cars pulled into the lot, she heard Duncan groan and sit up behind her. She glanced back at him morosely.

"So we killed them," she said quietly. "Didn't we?" It wasn't a question, but Duncan answered anyway, shrugging and sighing heavily.

"Of course."

Courtney glared at her lap. The cigarette lighter beeped, alerting her that it was heated, and on impulse, she tugged it out and savagely pressed the hot end into the palm of her left hand. As she sobbed from the pain, Duncan hurdled into the front seat and snatched the lighter away, dropping it into the ashtray, pulling a cigarette out and using the scorched flesh on her hand to light it. Courtney pulled her hand away, wailing, as Duncan took a drag from his cigarette.

"Ich Luge bullets!" she howled. "I'm an idiot!"

The school busses were starting to pull up, and Duncan spoke quietly in the hope of calming her. "You believed it because you wanted to believe it," he explained. "Your true feelings were too gross and icky for you to face."

Courtney looked up at him incredulously. "I did not want them dead!"

"Did too."

"Did not!"

"Did too!"

"Did not!"

"Did too! Did too! Did too! Did too! Did too! Did too! Did too! Did too! Did too! Did too! Did too! Did too! Did –"

Courtney slammed her hands over her ears. "Mary had a little lamb, little lamb, little lamb –"

"Did too! Did too! Did too! Did too! Did too! Did –"

"MARY HAD A LITTLE LAMB WHOSE FLEECE WAS WHITE AS SNOW –" Courtney banged on the horn to drown out Duncan's increasingly louder "Did too!"s

Gwen and Lindsay sauntered through the parking lot, but stopped to contemplate Courtney's hiccupping car and its sparring occupants. Gwen chuckled. "Ah, young love," she commented to Lindsay, who took a moment to understand the joke before lazily nodding back.

Staci bounded up to the two girls. Gwen raised her eyebrows and was about to tell her to shove off when Staci spoke. "Did you hear?" she squealed. "School's cancelled today because Scott and Brady killed themselves in a repressed homosexual suicide pact!"

Gwen's jaw dropped in both incredulity and amusement. "No way!"

Duncan pulled Courtney off the horn and offered her a cigarette from his pocket. She fell silent and put it between her lips, but didn't move to light it.

"Football season's over, Princess," he said quietly. "Scott and Brady had nothing to offer the school but date-rapes and AIDS jokes."

Courtney took the cigarette out of her mouth and tucked it into her pocket, before wearily looking down at her burnt hand. "Sure. Can we make an ice run before the funeral?" Duncan nodded as around them, students returned to their cars and the busses pulled back out of the lot.


	8. Conscience

Mr Kelly was exactly how Courtney had imagined him: a typical hillbilly dad, who looked like he might have once been part of a meth lab but had ultimately decided that aggressive-sports-dad-who-thinks-he's-the-coach was a more suitable career. He was leaning over Scott's open coffin, where the boy himself was wearing a black football helmet and a black football jersey. Father Ripper and the congregation watched intently as Mr Kelly spoke to the boy in the coffin.

"If th're's any way you can hear me, Scott buddy," Mr Kelly was saying, "I don't care that you w're really some pansy. Y're my flesh-n-blood. You made me proud." He looked up to gaze tearily at the crowd. "I love my homosexual son. My son's gay, 'n' I love him!"

Courtney rolled her eyes behind her dark glasses, and leaned against Duncan's shoulder. "Your son's dead and you love him," she murmured disbelievingly. Duncan voiced her own thoughts when he replied.

"How do you think Mr Kelly would react to a son with a limp wrist with a pulse?"

Courtney huffed in amusement, a smile tugging at her lips, but then she made eye-contact with a little girl with curly red hair and a tear-stained face – a little girl who was wearing Scott's football jersey. Courtney's smile vanished, and replaced itself with a nauseated grimace.

That night, she lay on her bedroom floor, alternating drinking vodka out of a Dixie cup and listening to the blaring radio, hoping the crappy music would block out the guilt she was feeling after seeing Scott's sister at the funeral. But it seemed that she couldn't even escape reality in her own safe haven.

"As you know," the DJ was saying, "the Wawanakwa Teen Suicide tote is up to three. Here's one for Scott and Brady, The Drama Brothers with Teenage Suicide (Don't Do It)…"

As the drums and synths kicked in, playing repetitive catchy riffs, Courtney slammed the off-button on the wireless and reached for her phone instead. Maybe Duncan would have something interesting to say to distract her.

But that was a bust too. Courtney's side of the following conversation was along the lines of:

"Hello, Duncan?"

"No, it's okay, I just kind of wanted to talk…"

"Oh, a newsmagazine show on Channel 16?"

"Really? On the suicides."

"No, sounds great."

"Bye."

She hung up and turned instead to her battered diary, which lay on the bedside table next to a blue biro. Courtney pulled both down to the floor, screwed her monocle into place, took a generous gulp of vodka, and began to write.

 _Dear Diary –_

 _My teen angst_ _bullshit_ _now has a body count._

She sighed gloomily, not noticing Brittany slip into the room and begin to lap out of the Dixie cup, and continued to write.

 _The most popular people in school are dead. Everyone's sad, but it's a good kind of sad. Suicide gave Heather depth, Scott a soul, Brady a brain. I gave Duncan shit about the Ich Luge thing, but what really frightens me is that I'm not frightened by what Duncan will do next. It's God versus my boyfriend, and God's losing…_

Courtney groaned quietly and let the diary slip out of her hands. Popping out her monocle, she lay on her side and curled into a ball, falling into an uneasy rest.

It was an almost typical scene in the cafeteria the next day, with a cacophony of students munching and gossiping, and a jukebox roaring in the background. The only difference was that everyone was wearing black armbands to pay their respects to their dead classmates – at first. Then, at about ten to one, Miles Flemming bustled into the cafeteria with an entourage of students including Cody Anderson, Noah Dawson, and to the surprise of all, Gwen Duke. Miles cleared her throat.

"Cody, kill the jukebox."

The music ground to a halt as Cody pulled the plug out of the wall, leaving the last few bars of "What's New, Pussycat?" to float through the air and die. As many students breathed a sigh of relief (the song had already been played eighteen times with the exception of a single "It's Not Unusual" slipped into the middle; someone's idea of an amusing joke), Miles hoisted a bullhorn up to her lips. What was about to follow may actually have been worse than the music.

"COULD I HAVE YOUR ATTENTION?"

A startled Harold McGrady sputtered milk down his front. Students whipped their heads around to curiously watch Miles. Even Beth Dumptruck warily looked up from her plate in the corner of the cafeteria.

"OUR SCHOOL HAS BEEN TORN APART BY TRAGEDY," Miles chanted, with a sort of self-importance that was soaring to new and unprecedented heights. "I'M HERE TO FUSE IT BACK TOGETHER THROUGH **TOGETHERNESS**. I WANT EVERYONE TO CLASP HANDS. WE NEED TO CONNECT THIS CAFETERIA INTO ONE MIGHTY CIRCUIT."

Not one student moved. Instead, a tableau of dumbfounded students gazed up at the bullhorn-wielding hippie.

With a hangover from hell (before this whole thing started, Courtney had never been much of a drinker), she decided to skip the morning at school and head in for lunch. Dressed in a stylish purple coat, black-and-cream patterned scarf, and a smart black hat, she slid a pair of round sunglasses up her nose to cover her bloodshot eyes, and attempted to tie a black armband onto herself in order to blend in with the rest of the mourning students while balancing a pile of books under one arm. As she approached the cafeteria entrance, she caught sight of Miles stood at the front like Evita Peron – although her composure was rapidly crumbling.

 _What have I just walked into?_

"YO, WHAT'S THE PROBLEM?" Miles bellowed into the bullhorn, ignoring the students wincing at her attempt to sound hip and down with the youth. "I KNOW YOU KNOW HOW TO HOLD HANDS. RING-AROUND-THE-ROSY-A-POCKETFUL-OF-POSY…" Nothing. "OH, FORGET IT!" Lowering the bullhorn for the first time, she glanced at her watch and then at Cody. "Where are they?!"

Courtney warily entered the cafeteria, her armband clamped under her arm as a lost cause. A second later, Gwen appeared next to her and tightly knotted it for her. Courtney raised her eyebrows at the green-clad girl, then did a double take. Gwen's hair was no longer flat and dull, but had been coiffed into a short, curly twenties bob. Ignoring this development for the moment she commented sarcastically, "I see Ms Phlegm's on another crusade. With usual success."

Gwen glanced over Courtney's shoulder with a smirk. "I have a feeling this one will work."

Courtney, frowning, followed Gwen's gaze, and took a step back in shock. Two two-person video camera crews and a newspaper photographer were bustling into the cafeteria. She got slightly battered as the second crew squeezed by, and stepped out of the way to simply gape. Still standing front and centre, Miles straightened up and smiled in relief, lifting the bullhorn back up.

"THE CAMERAS ARE HERE! LOCK YOUR PAWS!"

Looking slightly confused but rather awed, Staci and her country club friends were the first to latch onto each other. Zoey Finn and the rest of her table followed suit, and Courtney fought down a growing sense of queasiness. The cafeteria was beginning to look like a feeding frenzy, but instead of sharks surrounding a dead whale, it was hundreds of students clasping hands and vying for the video cameras' attention. Jocks and heavy metalers were jumping over and onto tables as they bumbled into anxious, hand-holding constellations as the camera crews wove through the cafeteria. The photographer snapped a picture of Cody with his arm around Izzy, who might have looked surprised if she'd been clearheaded enough to comprehend what was happening. It was bad. But it was about to get worse: Miles hurried ahead of the camera crews and grabbed hold of a chain of jocks, pulling it to connect with a chain of Zoey Finn-a-likes.

Courtney noticed Lindsay drearily look up from where she had clearly been napping on a table. Upon seeing the havoc around her, the blonde cheerleader pulled off her black armband and tied it around her eyes, before drooping her head back onto the table. Courtney would have laughed if she wasn't so horrified at the rest of the scene. Her books slowly slid out of her grasp and hit the floor.

In the corner, Beth Dumptruck nervously glanced at her out-of-control peers.

Courtney turned to share an exasperated look with Gwen, but to her shock, Gwen was smiling. "If you can't beat em…" she mouthed, before sliding over to sit on a handsome prep's lap. The photographer snapped a shot. Next to them, Miles forced Noah to stand between two heavy metalers. The photographer turned to where Cody had his arms around one of Harold's nerdy friends. And Courtney stood silently before the chaos, in the exact spot where Heather Chandler had stood just last Friday, not moving a muscle.

Miles was now standing with Harold and the geek squad. They looked warily over to where Beth Dumptruck stared back, before Harold turned to Miles.

"I may be a geek, but I have my pride."

"Gotcha," Miles agreed, before turning to the rest of the cafeteria to shout, "Could I get some stoners over here please?" She'd lost the bullhorn, thankfully, but her voice still carried, and seconds later boys and girls in frayed denim jackets with frizzy braided hair were drifting over, along with a strong smell of marijuana.

Frightened and flustered, Beth quaked in her seat for a moment before crawling underneath her table.

Courtney jumped as she felt a pair of arms fold around her, and glanced over her shoulder to see Duncan grinning madly as he hugged her. "Was this is good for you as it was for me?" he quipped. Courtney couldn't nod. She couldn't shake her head. All she could do was watch as Cody and Miles approached them.

"I'm gonna need a VHS copy of all this by Monday for my Princeton application," Cody was saying, but Miles's eyes were fixed on Courtney.

"Courtney, there you are!" she beamed. "Wasn't it Fab? I've put peer pressure out to pasture!"

Courtney found her voice at last. "Oh, come on, Miles," she said coldly, not even bothering with the general respect to call the teacher 'Ms Flemming'. Miles didn't deserve her respect, not after this. "What happens tomorrow, when the cameras aren't here?" She didn't notice Duncan behind her fixated on the table Beth Dunnstock had just peaked out from under, before ducking away. Duncan curiously ambled towards the table.

Miles made an attempt to do an impression of Heather Chandler's famous 'you know you can't win' look, but it only made her look mildly constipated. "Why are you dissing me, Courtney? I'm trying to redefine the high school experience –"

"You're ignoring the high school experience," Courtney hissed. "People are dead –" _because of me_ "– and all you can think to do is whip up some warped Pity Party." She paused, seething. "If we're ever going to build respect for each other, it's gotta be something… something real. We can't be tricked into it. Back me up, Duncan." She glanced over her shoulder, but to her surprise, Duncan was nowhere to be seen. "Duncan?"

When she turned around, Miles was already moving off. "Let's go, Cody. Some people just aren't willing to share the pain…"

In the corner of the cafeteria, Beth slithered from under the table up into her seat, and with her head down, tried to finish off her bowl of soup. She glanced up, and suddenly froze. Seated across from her, behind a Rebel Without A Cause lunchbox, was a boy with shaggy black hair that had green tips. He smiled warmly, making the cafeteria light glint off the piercings in his nose and eyebrow.

"Greetings and salutations."

That evening, Courtney found herself sitting on Duncan's couch, rocking backwards and forwards with increasingly unguarded annoyance. Occasionally she'd pause in her furious mental diatribe to glare at Duncan, who, excitedly insensitive to her distress, was spinning the tuner of the radio with his headphones pressed to one ear. Eventually, she'd had enough.

"That thing this afternoon…" she burst out. "I'm so angry! It was like, 'Boy, isn't death fun!' 'Gee, I wonder who'll die next!' 'I'll bet we get four camera crews next time.' It was chaos. Fucking chaos."

Duncan giddily pivoted around, tearing the headphones from the radio so a blast of static accompanied his words. "What are you talking about?" he said gleefully. "Today was great. Chaos is great." He leaned against the entertainment console with faux-philosophical panache. "Chaos is what killed the dinosaurs, darling, and it's what's going to make Westerburg a purified place to get an education. Face it, our way is the way. We scare people into not being assholes."

Courtney fumed, a ticking time-bomb of suppressed rage. "Our way is not our way," she said through gritted teeth. Duncan snorted.

"Tell that to the judge; 'Your honour, I was led to believe their were Ich Luge bullets in the gun. Heck, tell it to Scott Kelly! 'Don't shoot, Courtney, I'm the quarterback!'"

Courtney angrily groped for something to throw at her vibrating boyfriend, and found a framed picture of a blonde woman in her thirties that would do the trick. To her annoyance, Duncan easily caught it, and stared her down with a wide grin.

"I'm telling it to you! YOU!" she snarled. "Nothing good can come from suicide, from murder, from death. Nothing! Nothing except more death and shit like that feeding frenzy this afternoon…" She paused for breath, panting. "Geez, what am I… who… Unnaah! You can be so immature!"

Making her even angrier was that Duncan had lost attention at the end of her rant, and was instead staring at the door. "You kids are making too much damn noise," he said eventually, eyes not wavering.

Courtney turned just as Big Bud Dean entered the room, smile on face, in one hand a chest exerciser and waving a video cassette in the other. "We beat the bitches," he grinned.

"Oh, beautiful," Courtney mumbled. "The Beaver's home."

Either Big Bud didn't hear her, or he didn't care. "Judge told em to slurp shit and die," he continued, as though she hadn't interrupted. He moved over to the entertainment console and turned off the radio, turning on the VCR instead and cramming the cassette in. Big Bud hefted his chest exerciser up as the image of a shabby building appeared on the massive TV. "I put a Norwegian in the boiler room," he chuckled. "Masterful. When that blew, it set off a pack of thermals I'd stuck upstairs." As the building blew up, he cackled, and Duncan politely applauded. Courtney was silent on the sofa as the older man popped out the cassette and bounced away. "Some days, it's just great to be alive!" he called over his shoulder. The second he was out of earshot, Courtney turned to Duncan, who was still staring at the TV.

"Do you like your father?"

Duncan shrugged, looking perplexed. "I've never given the matter much thought." He was silent for a moment before adding, "Liked my mother." He held up the picture Courtney had thrown at him. The blonde woman smiled sweetly through the glass. She had the same teal eyes as Duncan.

"They said her death was an accident," Duncan said. His voice was emotionless as he sank onto the couch next to her. "But she knew when the explosives were set to go off. She knew…"

He didn't need to continue. Courtney stared at him with dazed concern.

"In some sick way," she said quietly, "we unclogged the sinuses of the school. But if we're going to keep the school healthy, it's gotta be through something having to do with life, not death."

Duncan raised his eyebrows at her. "Whoa, Metaphor Tennis, anyone? Tell me, if you put a Nazi in a concentration camp, does that make you a Nazi?"

Courtney scowled. "Maybe."

Duncan gave a frustrated exhale before bounding up to turn the radio back on. The familiar DJ's voice blared into the room.

"Dudes, if I get one more request for that Drama Brothers song I'm going to commit suicide. Here it is…"

As the drums kicked in, Duncan gave a malevolent smirk. "They're playing our song," he purred, and as the vocals began shouting over the drums and synths, the boy began seductively moving towards Courtney, semi-lip-syncing along. As Courtney watched, seething with anger but a little turned on, he slithered onto the couch next to her.

"TIMES ARE MEAN FOR A TEEN – WE KNOW! PARENTS IGNORE, TEACHERS BORE – WE KNOW! BUT THERE'S MORE THAN ONE WAY TO GO! TEENAGE SUICIDE; DON'T DO IT! TEENAGE SUICIDE; DON'T DO IT!"

Courtney was about to lean in for a kiss that said 'I'm still mad but kinda want you right now', when Duncan suddenly paused. To her horror, he pulled a gun out of his coat pocket and giddily fired it at the radio, destroying it.

What shocked Courtney in that moment wasn't his irrational behaviour, or his apparent need to destroy something. It was the fact that she wasn't at all surprised.

"That's it, we're breaking up."

Duncan turned to her as she rose from the sofa, giving her a confused look. "Wha-a-at?" He pulled her back onto the couch, pressing a kiss to her neck. But instead of feeling sparks like she used to, Courtney felt nothing. He pressed another kiss next to it before pulling away to frown at her. "You can't bring them back. You must know that."

Courtney's face tightened. "I'm not trying to 'bring back' anybody… except maybe myself." She sighed, before rolling away from him into a crawling position on the floor, and getting to her feet to stand in a walking-out-the-door position. She gave him a cold look. "To think there was a time when I actually thought you were cool." He continued to look bemused, and she continued, "If you can't handle me now, just stay home and shoot your TV, blow up a couple toasters or something. Just don't come to school and don't mess with me." With that, she turned smartly and walked out the door, Duncan staring after her.

"You'll be back," he said eventually. He slowly sat up, and stared at the gun he was still holding. On impulse, he placed it in his mouth and paused. Then, biting down on the barrel of the gun, he proceeded to broodingly tie his shoelaces.


	9. Red

The science lab was dark at this time in the morning. Although it was a fairly harmless place in the daytime with the chemicals all locked away (a pity, Duncan thought to himself, Heather Chandler's hangover cure would have been a lot more interesting with some of the stuff in here), there was something creepy about it deserted. Something to do with liminal spaces, probably. Like being in a supermarket late on a Saturday night.

The door swung open, and the person he'd been waiting to meet with entered the room, glancing about as if to make sure no one spotted her enter Geek Domain. Of course, no self-respecting geek would be here at this time in the morning to risk messing up a teacher's schedule, so it was the perfect place for a clandestine meeting.

She sat across from him, but instead of acknowledging her arrival, Duncan instead chose to reach into his coat pocket and pull out a manila envelope, which he slid across to her. Her dark eyes narrowed suspiciously.

"What's in the envelope?"

"You're gonna want to see it."

Her narrowed eyes didn't leave his face as she slit open the envelope with a black acrylic nail that had been filed into a sharp point; indeed, she stared at him until she'd removed the contents of the envelope and spread them out on the desk in order to properly look at them.

"What the hell…" she whispered, her eyes widening as she realised what the contents were.

Photographs. 8x10s, precisely, taken with a late 70s camera and showing two smiling young dark-haired girls with their arms around each other, wearing summer camp uniforms with iron-on names in obnoxiously bright letters. One read BETH, and the other –

"Where did you get these?!" With a shaky hand, she picked up the next photo, this one showing the same two girls eating toasted marshmallows off each others' sticks.

"Oh, the other day I had just the nicest chat with Ms Dumptruck," Duncan grinned at her queasy intrigue. "Got along famously! It's scary how everyone's got a story to tell… I'm particularly fond of the canoeing shots."

"What is this? Blackmail?" If possible, her face had turned a shade paler. "So what, I once shared a bunk with the biggest loser in Canada. I'm not running for office…" Her pallor said otherwise. After a moment, she narrowed her eyes again, clearly coming to a decision. "I'll give you a week's lunch money."

Duncan shook his head, pushing the photographs back into the envelope. "I don't want your money," he said coolly. "I want your strength. Westerburg doesn't need mushy togetherness, it needs a leader. Heather Chandler was that leader…"

"But she couldn't handle it."

Duncan chuckled. She was on the ball. "I think you can. In Catcher in the Rye, Holden says his ideal job'd be making sure some kids don't fall off a cliff. He doesn't realize if you pay too much attention to the kids, you'll back off the cliff yourself."

"Very very," she nodded. "The photographs?"

"Don't worry. I'll ask you for a favour, one you'll enjoy. You'll get the negatives and everything back then." He got to his feet, heading for the door, but suddenly stopped and turned back to her. "In the mean time, strength. And hey, here's a little gift." He deposited a crumpled piece of red fabric in her hands and winked. "From one Red Queen to another."

She blinked and he was gone, the lab door swinging shut behind him.

The only proof that he'd ever been there was Heather Chandler's red scrunchie in her seemingly deathly pale hands.

* * *

She walked through the day in a daze until lunchtime, when she remembered the scarlet accessory tucked into her pocket and made for the bathroom. Splashing water on her face, she gazed at her reflection for the first time since leaving the house. Pale skin made paler by years of poor nutrition, dark spooked eyes outlined artfully, scarlet lips like a smear of blood. Short, curled dark hair that once had a lank dullness to it, but now it gleamed sharp and shiny. She blinked, and her eyes now looked less spooked and more hungry. Another blink, and it felt like Heather Chandler herself was staring back at her. They could have almost been twins.

With trembling hands, she pulled the scrunchie around her wrist, before gathering her hair into a half-ponytail and securing it with the red fabric. It would have been impossible to tell the difference (well. Not counting the fact that Heather had been half-Chinese while she was indisputably Caucasian) between the dead girl and the living one.

A stall door swung open behind her, and one of Zoey Finn's retro friends hurried over to wash her hands – a girl she would have once felt sympathy for. Near the bottom of the food chain, nothing more than a punching bag for the top predators when they couldn't find someone weaker.

The bathroom door swung open a second later, and two stylish girls entered the room. She had once feared these girls, constantly afraid that Heather would find them to be better fits for her clique and chuck her to the wolves, but now… now she could recognise the power they represented. They were minions waiting for the queen to give them instructions. And with the old queen dead, it was time for someone else to step into the spotlight.

Unconsciously, she dried her hands on the Zoey-Finn-a-like's dress, making the minions giggle. With a wink to them, she rolled her shoulders back and sashayed out of the bathroom and down the corridor. As people turned to stare at her, she smiled at the ones who deserved it and scowled at the ones who didn't. For the first time in a long time, she felt powerful.

And powerful felt good.

* * *

Courtney stared blankly ahead as she drifted down a corridor. True to what she'd told – what was his name again? Toffee? Trophy? – at the party Friday before last (had it really been just over a week since that single disastrous night?), she had never done any drug less legal than alcohol (Topher, that's what his name had been!), but she wondered if this was what pot might feel like. Floating. Out of touch with reality. Discombobulated. Unable to stick with any single thought without another drifting in at random to interrupt.

She and Duncan had dated for a week, during which they frequently got naked, committed murder, and attended the funerals on repeat. It had been a routine, of sorts. Sex, murder, funeral. Sex murder funeral. Sex murder- oh, wait, no, the last one had been interrupted by her own conscience poking its head out of a dark pit to try and remember what the moral high ground was like.

Huh. Sex-Murder-Funeral sounded a bit like the kind of band Heather pretended to like to make guys like Alejandro more interested in her. What's your favourite Sex-Murder-Funeral song? she would ask to know how best to answer. I think their second album was better than their first, she would say, to sound like she had her own opinions. I thought they were pretty very even before they became popular, she would add to sound cool, like she had been the one to make the band popular. I agree, they've totally become sell-outs to the Man, she'd finish, making the boy feel like he'd found his musical soulmate and sealing the deal on party invites for the foreseeable future.

There was something scary about how Heather was still around, even dead and buried six feet under. Courtney had disagreed with Duncan on a lot of points (moral ones, mainly) but she had to concede that he'd been right about one thing: dead, Heather Chandler had more power than she ever had alive. Even the scarlet locker covered in yellow police tape proclaiming POLICE LINE – DO NOT CROSS to her left underlined the way her power still ran rampant through the halls.

In a trance, Courtney stopped and turned to the sealed locker. On impulse, she glanced up and down the corridor to check that no one was watching her, and pulled her school ID out of her pocket, sliding it into the gap between the door and the frame and swiping it like a scanner, breaking the tape. While the school locks were cheap and notoriously easy to break, Heather's personal padlock was a little harder, with a four-digit combination. Courtney scowled at it for a moment before remembering the personality of the girl who'd owned it. Duh. 3-8-2-5 (on those upmarket mobile phone keypads it spelled out one of Heather's favourite words) made the padlock crack open, and Courtney dreamily swung the door open.

The only thing left in the locker itself was a scarlet blazer. The inside of the door was more interesting though – hung up was a sizable mirror, a cute little "HEATHER" license plate, a sticker proclaiming BRIAN MULRONEY FOR PRIME MINISTER, and a picture of the four of them – Heather, Courtney, Gwen and Lindsay – taken only a few weeks ago. They were all wearing oversized sunglasses and doing their best to look tough and disinterested. Courtney could barely remember the picture being taken. She zeroed in on a little three-frame photobooth picture strip, this one only showing Heather and herself. In the first picture, they stared at the camera, cool, bored and haughty. In the second, they were screaming at the top of their lungs. In the final frame, they were once again stonefaced. Courtney took a shaky breath and reached for the strip, but suddenly two hands covered her eyes, forcing her to stop in her tracks.

"Guess who?" a voice whispered.

Courtney froze, turning slowly as the hands fell away. Pale skin. Sharp eyes. Smirking red lips like a scarlet gash. And dark hair pulled away from an angular face by a bright red scrunchie. "Heather…"

The lips curved into a smile, and Courtney pulled back, noticing the differences she hadn't taken in at first sight. The hair was shorter, the eyebrows heavier, the chin too pointed, the nose too artificial. And this person was nearly a head shorter, and wore a pale green jacket…

Eyes wide with horror, Courtney shoved the smirking Gwen Duke away from her as violently as she could, hurrying away down the corridor thinking of nothing but getting away. Gwen stared after her, before turning her attention to the locker. Under the mirror, a little earring rack held a pair of scarlet metallic flowers with large hoops underneath them, from which dripped small teardrop shaped beads – the sort of dramatic jewellery that only Heather and sometimes Courtney had been allowed to wear. Biting her lip, she reached for them.

* * *

That night, Courtney sat on her bed, carefully dialling Gwen's number on her blue-lacquered phone. She paused when she was done, listening carefully, before wincing.

"Ouch," she muttered. "Your answer machine has the most obnoxious beep. Gwen, I'm sorry. I'm just calling to say you can wear your hair any way you want to."

Silence. Then, suddenly, someone picked up on the other end.

"Hey Courtney Sawyer," a male voice sneered. "Barf on anyone's carpet lately?"

Courtney blinked. "Is this Al? Heather's Al?"

"It's Alejandro," the boy replied grumpily.

"What are you…?"

"What can I say?" Alejandro smarmed. "I was pretty broken up by Heather's suicide. I needed someone super understanding – like Gwen."

"I'm delirious for the both of you," Courtney said coldly. "Can you put Gwen on?"

Silence. Then –

"She can't really talk right now," Alejandro said proudly.

Courtney slammed the phone down.

She paused, let out a shudder, then grabbed the sleek black address book in her lap and scanned through it. When it yielded no results, she tossed it over her shoulder (thoroughly upsetting Brittany, who had been curled up on the desk chair) and rummaged in her bedside drawer until she found a far older address book, this one pink polka-dotted and frayed. Quickly finding the number she was looking for, she once again carefully dialled and picked up the receiver. After a moment, the owner of the number picked up.

"Hello?"

Courtney smiled. "Hey, Zoey…"

* * *

"I don't believe it! I'm winning!"

Courtney couldn't help the motherly smile on her face as she watched Zoey Finn hit her ball through a wicket and squeal excitedly. "Don't get cocky, girl," she teased. Zoey chuckled nervously, bending down to shoot again, but suddenly she straightened up.

"I missed you," she smiled. "I know I not as, as exciting as your other friends –"

"That's bullshit," Courtney said firmly. "Just shoot." Zoey once again bent and then straightened back up.

"Court, I'm still a virgin," she admitted. "I French-kissed Mike Springer once, but –"

"Shoot the ball," Courtney chuckled warmly. Zoey nodded, and finally took her shot – although it seemed a little feeble.

"Zoey, your daydreams are a lot better than my realities," Courtney said softly. "Believe me." She giggled, bending down to take her own shot. "Now though, I'm afraid it's time to die."

"Court!"

Courtney laughed, taking her shot, but missing the wicket, instead hitting Zoey's ball. Chewing her lip, she deliberated what to do, before determinedly walking to her ball and moving it away from her friend's.

"Hey, you're not settling for the two shots, are you?" Zoey frowned. "Knock me out, girl. It's the only way."

"It's not my style, okay?"

Zoey shook her head. "Nice guys finish last. I should know."

Courtney sighed, before resignedly sending Zoey's ball sailing toward the patio – and a statuesque Gwen Duke, who didn't even flinch as the ball whizzed past her.

"Bravo!" she applauded mockingly. Zoey froze like a frightened rabbit, and carefully propped her mallet against a hedge.

"I've got to get going, Courtney," she said quietly. Courtey nodded sadly.

"Sure."

Gwen sashayed towards them, followed by Lindsay, whom Courtney hadn't noticed at first simply because she seemed so utterly desultory. The blonde girl picked up the green mallet and fragilely swung it; her old familiar robustness seemed a forgotten memory. "Croquet won't be the same without Heather," she said quietly.

Gwen ignored her, instead choosing to sneer condescendingly at Zoey as she headed into the house. "Aw, Zoey, leaving so soon? …HEY, I'M RED!"

* * *

Courtney watched as Gwen savagely sent Lindsay's green ball flying into the flowerbed, shaking her head in silent disapproval. As Lindsay muttered "Shit," and followed the ball, Gwen turned back to Courtney.

"You know what really bites?" she asked, setting up her own shot. "When people watch all that cafeteria stuff on TV and see all those geeks and metalheads jumping around, they're going to think Uncool is the Rule at Westerburg." Her shot swerved wide of the wicket. "Damn!"

Courtney leaned down, setting up her own shot. "You're so polluted," she muttered. "Talking down to people, making fake notes…" She swung angrily, flubbing her shot.

"I don't see what gives you the right to lecture, Court," Gwen said coolly. "You were soulmates with Zoey Finn until you realised you're the cover of Seventeen magazine and she's the before half of a Scarsdale Diet ad." She bashed her ball into Courtney's and prepared to send it. "Some people just don't matter. Why should those who do carry their weight? Am I right?" As she swung her mallet, Courtney stepped on her own ball. When Gwen's mallet made contact, the two balls slammed against each other with a loud smack, unmoving.

"No," Courtney said coldly. "You're wrong. It's not even your turn."

"She's right…" Lindsay said despondently, and the two girls turned to see her lying on the grass propped against a tree. "Boy, croquet's not the same without Heather."

Gwen shook out her wrist, dropping her mallet. "I don't know what your damage is, Courtney, but me and Lindsay are going to walk over to the Mall. Maybe by the time we head back, your tampon'll be flushed." She spun and headed back into the house, Lindsay following her. Annoyed, Courtney marched up the steps after them, not sure what she was going to do – maybe shake some sense into Gwen? – but something distracted her: Duncan, of all people, was sitting at the patio table with a drink.

"Christ, doesn't anybody knock?" she snarled.

"Mummy and Daddy let me in," Duncan grinned. "So I'm a dark horse, huh? You make me blush…"

Courtney reached the patio, gently swinging her mallet. Her instincts told her to be wary, but she couldn't help but excitedly wonder if he'd come to change his ways.

"Did you come to tell me something?" she asked, a slight edge to her voice. "Something nice. Remotely apologetic."

Duncan didn't even seem to hear her. "How about that Gwen Duke, huh?" he chirped. "I say it's about time we got down to doing what we do best."

Courtney angrily blew her bangs out of her face. "Just finish your drink and get out," she snapped, before spinning on her heel and storming back into the house.

* * *

Beth Dunnstock sat glumly in the gym bleachers, sipping an extra-big Big Gulp. The place echoed with shouts and cheers typical of a big game; memories rather than reality.

Reality being that she was alone with her Big Gulp.

She tipped the cup to angle the straw better, but the lid popped off and a gush of sticky soda splashed onto her Drama Brothers T-shirt.

* * *

The inside of the Sawyer residence wasn't much better for Courtney's temper than the outside. Her parents were parked in front of the TV, watching a video image of Miles Flemming at a cafeteria table, and Courtney made a face, remembering Friday's utter shitshow. Her dad didn't even look up as she entered; her mom only looked up briefly.

"Duncan's kinda cute for a dark horse," she said cheerily, before turning back to the TV, where Miles was bullshitting her way through an interview.

 **"** **The Westerburg Suicides were tough on all of us, but we shared the pain of losing three very popular souls…"**

"I don't know about that coat he was wearing though," her dad commented. "Hey, isn't that the flake we met at Open House?"

Courtney ignored him, zombiesquely floating past them to stare at the TV.

 **"I came into the cafeteria and asked them to hold hands. The response was immediate."** Footage of the frenzied handholding students began to unfold upon the screen with no evidence of the calculation behind it. Miles' sanctimoniously dulcet tones continued to drone in the background. **"My mere words liberated the students, causing them to open their petals and reveal their hopes and fears. By a stroke of luck, TV cameras were fortunate enough to happen to be on hand to capture this spontaneous, natural emotional outpouring of emotion."**

"Happened to be on hand?" Courtney muttered incredulously. "Spontaneous natural emotional outpouring…?"

Her parents ignored her, squinting around her to stare transfixed at the screen. "Look, there's Gwen," her dad said cheerfully.

"And there's Lindsay," her mom added. "Where are you, Courtney?"

Courtney didn't respond. The image had returned to Miles sitting at the cafeteria table.

 **"** **Whether to commit suicide is the most important decision a teenager has to make. With supervision from people like myself, we can help young people make the right decision."**

Courtney lifted her croquet mallet and used the handle to poke the on/off button. As the TV powered down, leaving a greenish haze around the screen, she spun to face her parents.

"I'm right here!" she snapped.

* * *

Beth trudged out of the school, the soda stain grotesquely encrusted to her once pseudo-fashionable shirt. She paused and fumbled with a safety pin, attaching a note to her shirt over the still damp stain, which rapidly soaked into it, leaving it illegible except for the words "DEAR WESTERBURG" at the top. Not noticing it even for a second, Beth walked slowly down the pavement out of the school zone to where the traffic began to speed up again; an area notorious for over-zealous drivers going too fast.

* * *

"Turn that back on!"

Courtney ignored her mother, kneeling behind the entertainment unit and yanking the television cord from its socket. "Can't you see?" she snarled. "These little programs eat up suicide with a spoon! They make it seem like it's a cool thing to do!"

"If we're not going to watch that program, can I put the game on?"

Courtney ignored her father too. "Hey kids!" she continued, faking commercial jingle cheeriness. "Make your parents and teachers feel like shit! Get the respect in death you'll never get in life!"

"Are you trying to tell me it is not a troubled time for the nation's youth?" her mother spluttered. "Get up off the floor, your dress is getting filthy!"

"See what I mean?" Courtney shouted. "Everybody cares about youth, not the individual." She grudgingly got up, turning towards her parents imploringly. "All we want is to be treated like human beings. Not to be experimented on like guinea pigs and patronized like bunny rabbits."

"I do not patronize bunny rabbits," her father spluttered. Her mother got to her feet and planted her hands on her hips, staring her daughter down.

"Treated like human beings?" she snapped. "Is that what you said, Little Miss Voice of a Generation? Just how do you think adults act with other adults? You think it's all just Doubles Tennis? Adults can be horrible to other adults. When teenagers complain they want to be treated like human beings, it's usually because they are being treated like human beings."

Courtney leaned back against the wall, staring at the ground with a melancholy smile. "I guess I picked the wrong time to be a human being," she said quietly.

Her mother looked flustered, and sat back down on the couch, smoothing her skirt. "You'll live," she said, unable to keep an embarrassed waver out of her voice, before gesturing at the tray on the table. "Want some pate?"

A silent beat passed before the front door swung open, and Gwen Duke breezed into the room, laden with shopping bags. "Hi everyone, door was open," she said cheerily, before turning excitedly to Courtney. "Have you heard, Courtney? We were doing Chinese at the Food Fair, right, when they come over the radio and say Beth Dumptruck tried to buy the farm. She bellyflopped in front of a car, wearing a suicide note."

Courtney's jaw dropped in repulsion. "Is she dead?" she asked apprehensively.

"That's the punchline!" Gwen giggled. "She's still alive, in stable condition. Another case of a geek trying to imitate the popular people of the school and failing miserably." Her attention turned from the storm brewing on Courtney's face to the table. "Ooh, is that pate?"

Courtney slapped her hard in the face.

* * *

Gwen paced around Courtney's bedroom, holding an icepack to her jaw. Courtney watched her, glumly sprawled across the bed. "I said I was sorry."

"You are out of control!" Gwen snapped. "Heather and Scott were a shock, but Beth Dumptruck? Get crucial! She dialled suicide hotlines in her diapers."

"You're not funny. Turn on the radio."

Gwen ignored her, propping the icepack between her jaw and her shoulder to fix her scrunchie, which had slid down out of its Heather Chandler-esque style. "Beth couldn't take the heat, so she got out of the kitchen. Just think what a better place the world would be if every nimrod followed her cue."

"Just shut up and turn on the radio!" Courtney repeated. "Total Drama is on."

"Oh, shit, yeah." Gwen hurried to flick on the radio, before grabbing a bag of barbeque corn nuts and ripping it open, settling on the bed at Courtney's feet as the troubled voice of a teenage boy cut the air.

 **"** **I know it's supposed to be funny that they never get off the island, but still, sometimes I feel like** **I'm** **on that island and Gilligan can be just so** **stupid** **sometimes."**

Gwen crunched a corn nut. "This sounds like a good one."

Popular radio host Chris McLean's familiar chuckle replied. **"Dude, you've got to remember if it wasn't for the courage of the fearless crew, the Minnow would be lost. The Minnow would be lost! Next call!"**

 **"** **But Skipper hates me…"** the boy protested. There was a click as Chris disconnected the call.

 **"** **Whoa, they're coming out early tonight,"** he laughed. **"What ever happened to abortions and acne? You've got the Dogcatcher and you're listening to Total Drama."** There was a click as he connected the next call. A female voice filtered through.

 **"** **My name is Lindsay, I mean, not Lindsay… It's Madonna. Geez, no, not that."** Courtney met Gwen's eyes in stunned silence.

 **"** **Hey, babe?"** Chris coughed after a moment's silence. **"I need a name."**

More silence. Then –

 **"** **My name is Tweety."**

Chris sniggered. **"Yo, Tweet, if you're calling to tell me you just saw a puttytat…"**

Lindsay – or rather, Tweety – gave a broken sob. **"God has cursed me, I think,"** she said miserably. **"The last time I had sex, the guy killed himself the next day. I'm failing Math."**

"Holy shit, that's Lindsay!" Gwen spluttered, excitedly jumping to her feet. "Our Lindsay! Lindsay McNamara!"

Courtney could only listen in horror as Lindsay continued, **"My whole life is a mess. I'm supposed to be captain of the Varsity cheerleading team next year, but I probably won't be because I miss practice when my dad visits."**

"Oh man," Courtney groaned. "She knows we listen to this show!"

 **"** **My parents are divorced and stuff…"**

A slow smile spread across Gwen's face, and Courtney felt her stomach sinking. The once meek-and-mousy girl across from her cackled wildly, any remnants of her past self completely gone. "We'll totally crucify her!"


	10. Pills

_**POOR LITTLE LINDSAY**_ , read the writing on the board.

Courtney shook her head, lips pressed together, before continuing to write her latest diary entry.

 _Gwen told everyone about Lindsay._

She glanced up at the seat in front of her, where Lindsay sat staring at Gwen's handwriting. She wore her red and white cheer uniform, with her blonde hair pulled into a high ponytail, and the look allowed Courtney to see the way her jaw was clenched and her shoulders tensed up. It was a stance far too familiar – that of someone struggling not to cry. Courtney exhaled wearily before continuing to write.

 _Yes, Dear Diary, I've cut off Heather Chandler's head, and Gwendolyn Duke's head has sprouted in its place like some mythological thing my eighth grade boyfriend would have known about. Gwen's even doing the old note trick._

Courtney glanced up again, this time focussing on the girl seated a few rows to Lindsay's left. Gwen Duke was chatting up a storm with a dark-haired football player (Devin something?), curling her hair around her fingers and giggling girlishly whenever he made a joke. Courtney then turned to the back of the classroom, where a homely blonde wearing a too-baggy knitted jumper was glancing hopefully between Gwen's football player friend and a note clutched in her hands, totally unaware that she'd been set up for heartbreak. Courtney glanced back at Gwen, feeling her lip curl in involuntary disgust, then turned back to her diary.

 _I've seen Duncan's way. I've seen Miles's way. Nothing's changed. I guess that's Gwen's way. And, Jésus, what about Duncan? I can't get him out of my head. Are we going to the Prom? Or to Hell? And where's Lindsay going?_

She watched with a frown as Lindsay rose and speedwalked to the door, pushing past Ms MacArthur as the Maths teacher entered. MacArthur frowned after the cheerleader. "Where's Lindsay going?"

Gwen giggled wickedly. "She's going to cry-y-y-y-y!"

* * *

In the girls' bathroom, Lindsay struggled to open a small container of sleeping pills. "Fucking child protector caps," she muttered, whacking it against the counter. The top burst off, sending pills scattering everywhere.

* * *

As Ms MacArthur wrote up a maths problem on the board, Courtney fidgeted for a moment before abruptly pushing her chair out and standing up, so sharply she felt dizzy for a moment, then marching out of the classroom after Lindsay. She barely heard MacArthur spluttering behind her as she raced down the hall.

"Now where's she going? Is someone getting raped today on All My Children or what?"

* * *

Lindsay glared through her tears at her reflection, a chipmunk with a mouth full of pills. She pulled a glass from her purse and held it under the cold tap; no water came out. "Gimme a break," she mumbled around the pills. She moved to the next sink, and managed to get water from it just as Courtney burst through the door. There was a moment of silence as their eyes met, then Courtney rushed forward and punched Lindsay in the face, making the pills explode out of her mouth. Lindsay slumped back against the wall.

"What are you trying to do?" she demanded. "Kill me?"

"What are you trying to do?" Courtney snarled back, grinding pills beneath the heel of her boot. "Sleep?"

"Suicide is a private thing," Lindsay scowled. Courtney lunged forward to strike her again, and Lindsay recoiled with a wail, sliding down to sit on the floor.

"Throwing your life away to become a goddamn statistic in fucking Ontario Today is about the least private thing I can think of."

Lindsay surveyed her through lowered lashes. "But what about Heather? And Scott and Brady?" she mumbled

Courtney slid down the wall to sit beside her. "Cariña, if everyone jumped off a bridge, would you?"

Lindsay wiped her tearstained face with a weak smile. "Probably."

Courtney took the other girl's hand, giving it a reassuring squeeze. "Hey now," she said comfortingly. "If you were happy every day of your life, you wouldn't be human. You'd be a reality show host."

Lindsay nodded, moving to lay her head on Courtney's shoulder. "Let's knock off early," she suggested. "Buy some shoes. Something lame like that."

"Sure."

* * *

"So it's come to this," Duncan said, lounging at a desk and watching Gwen torch the manila envelopes with a green plastic lighter. "Heather Chandler did polls. I want you to do a Petition, as a favour – as the favour. You've heard the group The Drama Brothers, right?"

" _Teenage Suicide, Don't Do It!_ " Gwen quipped with a grin.

Duncan nodded, grinning back at her. "Some teenybopper rag said that The Drama Brothers want to play a Prom. It could be Westerburg's if we can get everybody's John Hancock." He flipped a stack of connected computer printout sheets, blank except for a short paragraph and the word 'PETITION' at the top, over to Gwen, who blew the ashes off her desk and grabbed them with a smirk.

"I'll get right on it, coach," she giggled. "And hey, a little gift. I won't be needing it." She twirled her copy of The Catcher In The Rye over to Duncan, who caught it, looking pleased.

* * *

Gwen Duke gothically ascended a staircase during her free period the next day, pausing at a sunlit window on the landing. She stretched out on the wide sill, grinning out at the grounds of her kingdom. Only a day and a half since Duncan had asked his favour, and she nearly had every signature in the school.

During lunch the day before, she'd cornered the preps the way Heather had used to, even hearing the familiar words muttered as she sashayed towards them.

"Oh great. Here comes He-Gwen."

"Shit."

After school she'd appealed to the bus kids, and before school that very morning she'd got an entire truckload of Heavy Metalers to sign – with the help of some strategically placed fake piercings and spiky bracelets. At lunch she'd simply unbuttoned her blouse halfway and hiked up her skirt, and within minutes every jock in school had signed. Then all she'd needed was a denim jacket to blend in to the smoke-filled corridor next to the fire exit, and by the time the bell rang, all the stoners had signed too.

Yes, it had been quite a successful day-and-a-half, and Gwen lounged blissfully in the sunlight, grinning at her stack of sheets, until a perplexed voice interrupted her.

"Gwen?"

Gwen glanced up to see Courtney descending the steps from the next floor up, and couldn't help feeling a little annoyed. Since she herself had assumed the role of Red, Lindsay had started assuming the role of Green, and it ought to be up to Courtney to assume the role of Yellow – then they would find a new Blue, and once again be the perfect alliance, only with Gwen at the head. But instead, Courtney stood there staring at her, wearing a defiantly navy jacket and matching shorts. Gwen pasted on a smile and waved her petition in greeting.

"Courtney! Colour me stoked, girl. I've gotten everyone to sign this petition, even the ones who think The Drama Brothers are tuneless Eurofags. People love me!" She tossed off an airy giggle. "My God, you haven't signed!"

Courtney's face tightened. "People love you, but I know you," she said coldly. Gwen's smile flickered, and Courtney continued, "Bridgette Forbes told me the petition _she_ signed was to put a wave machine in the cafeteria. And Geoff Hylton –"

"So some people need different kinds of 'convincing' than others." Gwen rolled her eyes, her faux happiness evaporating in an instant. "Hey, just sign the petition!" Courtney glared silently. Time for a new approach. "Look, it was Duncan's idea!" Gwen snapped. "He made out the signature sheet and everything. Now will you sign it?"

Courtney inhaled sharply, looking like she might be about to throw up. "No," she said, sounding almost… queasy. Gwen smirked.

"Jealous, much?"

The next thing Gwen felt was a stinging pain on her already-bruised-makeup-covered right cheek. She reeled, clutching her face, glaring at Courtney who glared right back, her slap-happy right hand still raised.

"Gwen, why can't you just be a friend?" Courtney demanded. "Why do you have to be such a MegaBitch?"

"Because I can be," Gwen gasped out. "The same fucking cheek, goddamnit!" She straightened up, still clutching her face. "Why are you pulling my dick? Do you think, do you really think, if Zoey Finn's fairy godmother had made _her_ cool, she'd still act nice and hang out with her dweebette friends? No way! Uh-uh!" She one-handedly gathered up her petition and stumbled for the stairs as the bell rang. "Fuck me gently with a chainsaw…"

* * *

Courtney glared after Gwen, not moving to go to class, when suddenly a familiar baritone cut through her silent rage, and she grimly turned to see Duncan descending the same stairs she herself had just come down.

"Wanna go out tonight?" he asked, smirking. "Catch a movie? Maybe some miniature golf?"

Courtney scanned him up and down as he reached her, deciding to try something. "I was thinking more along the lines of slitting Gwen Duke's wrists open and making it look like a suicide," she caustically joked.

Duncan grinned widely, sliding behind her wrapping his arms around her middle in a hug. "I could be up for that," he whispered. "I've already started underlining some _meaningful_ passages in Gwen's copy of The Catcher In The Rye, if you know what I mean. This is great, Princess. I knew you'd come back."

Courtney closed her eyes as he kissed the back of her neck, before ramming her elbow hard into his stomach and wriggling away as he doubled over.

"It's over, Duncan!" she said angrily. "Over! Grow up!" She bolted down the stairs, barely hearing him calling after her.

"I don't get it! You were wrong! I was right! Strength, damnit! Come back!"

But Courtney only stared forwards as she dashed to the class she was already detention-worthily late for, internally berating herself for her moment of weakness. Duncan wouldn't listen to her, and there was no point in trying to make him.


	11. Nightmare

Courtney was indeed given detention for her lateness, but the second it was over she bolted home, entering the front door with a white-knuckled grip on her bag. She made to dash up the stairs, but her mother called her into the living room, sounding worried. With a grimace, she entered, and found her parents staring at her with aggressively compassionate faces.

"Yes?" Courtney asked awkwardly.

Her parents glanced at each other before her mother spoke. "Your friend Duncan Dean just stopped by. He seemed very concerned about you; he said he thinks you might try to kill yourself."

Before Courtney could even show her shock on her face, her father added, "You have been depressed lately. Oh –" he pulled a small envelope out of his pocket, "he said this is for you."

Courtney took the envelope apprehensively and ripped it open. It only contained a small piece of paper, across which looped a message in her own elegant manuscript:

 _Recognise the handwriting?_

"Oh my god…" she whispered, before darting for the stairs. Her mother's voice echoed after her.

"He says we should keep you away from sharp objects, closed garages, toxic –"

Courtney slammed her bedroom door, before glancing up and wishing she hadn't. A brunette Barbie in a _The Drama Brothers_ T-shirt hung from a tiny noose suspended from a rafter. With a whimper, Courtney glanced at the open window, before diving for her bed.

* * *

Duncan laconically leaned against his motorcycle, legs crossed suavely. He looked up at Courtney's bedroom window, the ladder still propped up next to it, and heard another whimper emerge. He put a cigarette in his mouth and lit it with a smile.

* * *

Courtney curled into the foetal position, closing her eyes as the ever familiar voice rang out across the room.

"You can't ever find a place nice and peaceful because there isn't any."

Courtney opened her eyes to see Duncan kneeling over her on her bed, reading aloud from Gwen's old copy of _The Catcher In The Rye_.

"Nice," he commented. "It's got that Catcher-In-The-Rye-I-hate-the-world-and-the-world-hates-me-so-let's-commit-suicide ambience." He chuckled softly. "Hey, give it a try. Underline something." He giddily finished underlining the sentence he'd just read out before tossing the book to Courtney and sliding out to lie next to her. Courtney glared at him, enraged.

"Get off my bed, you sick psycho," she hissed. "You think you're a rebel. You're not a rebel. You're a sick psycho. Do you think you're a rebel?" Her voice got louder as her rage increased. "Do you think you're a rebel?" she repeated. "I wanna know!"

Duncan shrugged. "You say tomayto, I say tomahto." He shrugged one-shoulderedly. "Let's call the whole thing off… Hold it!"

Courtney froze. Duncan reached over to where her index finger had curled automatically into the book. He carefully opened it and peered at the word her finger had landed on.

"Look at that," he said softly. "'Eskimo'. One word. I love it. I usually go for whole sentences myself, but hey! This is perfecto. 'Eskimo'. So mysterious…"

"Wait a… You're not listening!" Courtney shouted. "I'm not on your side…"

* * *

The sound of the lock being jimmied echoed through the kitchen seconds before they burst through the back door. Duncan wasted no time in pulling on a pair of disposable rubber gloves, before heading to the dishwasher and opening it like a burglar opening a safe. Courtney followed him, hissing like an angry goose.

"You're still not listening! I'm not…"

"Nag, nag, nag, nag," Duncan mocked her, before pulling a knife from the dishwasher. "Nag." He stuck his tongue out.

Courtney snatched the knife. "This knife is filthy!"

"What the hell do you think I'm going to do with it? Take out her tonsils?"

"I think I know Gwen a bit better than you, okay?" Courtney snapped. "If she was going to slash her wrists, the knife would be absolutely spotless."

Duncan rolled his eyes, but grabbed a dishtowel and vigorously wiped off the knife. "How's this? Can you see your fucking reflection?"

Courtney looked, and she could. She saw the tears welling up in her eyes, and felt her body shudder as a shattered smile quaked onto her face.

"Tomorrow someone else will move into her place," she whispered. "That person could be me." She looked up at him, suddenly deliriously defiant. "Ha, there's only one of us who knows Gwen's handwriting, and if you think I'm doing another suicide note –"

Duncan interrupted her with a burst of wild laughter. "You don't get it, do you? Society nods its head at any horror the American teenager can think to bring upon itself! We don't need gloves, and does anyone really care about exact handwriting?"

He tore his gloves off with a giggle, before grabbing a pen and a cutesy memo pad from the kitchen counter. He shoved the pen into Courtney's hand, before grabbing her wrist and forcing her to scribble two words in all caps.

 ** _LIFE SUCKS!_**

"Perfecto," Duncan smiled. "Man, I've even got a marked-up _Catcher In The Rye_. What else does a suicide need?" He pulled the book from his pocket and opened the door to the living room, revealing Gwen asleep in an artful pose on the couch, the TV flashing MTV behind her. He raised the knife and wiggled his eyebrows. "Now, if you'll excuse me…"

"NO-O!" Courtney screamed, but Duncan had already slammed the door. Wailing, she maniacally rattled the doorknob, but he'd already locked it.

* * *

On Friday, an ethereal Miles Flemming scratched a chalk mark on a blackboard, next to three others.

* * *

On Monday, Noah, Cody and Leshawna manoeuvred pictures of Heather, Brady, Scott and Gwen in mind-bogglingly countless ways in order to accommodate them in the two-page layout.

* * *

On Tuesday, four students wearing 'What a Waste, Oh the Humanity' T-shirts stood on the cafeteria tables and tossed black armbands into the hungry crowd.

* * *

On Wednesday, Gwendolyn Duke lay serenely in her open coffin in front of the congregated funeral-goers. Father Ripper, wearing dark sunglasses and a terrifying toupee, walked in front of her to address the sizeable group of students and adults, who gazed back from their own dark sunglasses, sat, statue-like, in folding chairs before him. Father Ripper swept the room with a dramatic look before finally speaking.

"'Eskimo'." He let the word hang, before holding up a book – the book. "Gwendolyn Duke underlined a lot of things in this copy of _The Catcher In The Rye_ , but I believe the word 'Eskimo', underlined all by itself, is the key to understanding Gwen's pain."

Standing next to the basin of Holy Water, Courtney could only stare disbelievingly as the priest brandished the book.

"On the surface, Gwen Duke was the vivacious young lady we all knew her to be. But her soul was in Antarctica, freezing with the knowledge of the way fellow teenagers can be cruel, the way parents can be unresponsive, and as she writes so eloquently in her suicide note, the way life can suck. We'll all miss Wawanakwa's little Eskimo. Let's hope she's rubbing noses with Jesus."

"Is this turnout weak or what? I had at least seventy more people at my funeral."

Courtney froze, turning to stare at the dark-haired girl standing next to her, who glared right back. Heather Chandler's mouth was still stained blue, but now her hair was done up in an elaborate twist, and she was dressed in what looked like some kind of intergalactic prison uniform, all sharp angles and red leather and black-and-white stripes.

"Heather?" she whispered. "What…?"

"Oh God, Courtney," Heather sighed. "My afterlife is so-o-o boring. If I have to sing 'Kumbaya' one more time…"

"What are you doing here?!"

Heather Chandler grinned. "I made your favourite," she whispered. "Spaghetti. Lots of oregano." She pulled the silver cover off the Holy Water basin, and continued to grin at Courtney with those blue lips, before plunging the other girl's face into the basin, which was now full of steaming spaghetti. "DINNER!"

* * *

Courtney's eyes snapped open. Uncurling from the foetal position she had fallen asleep in, she could hear her mother's voice filtering through the door. _It was all a dream…_

"Dinner! Courtney! Dinner!"

Courtney closed her eyes, her heart racing. Ignoring her mother, she launched herself at her desk, opened her diary, shoved on her monocle, and grabbed a pen – the expensive calligraphy kind. This entry was going to be special.

 _Dear Diary –_

 _Last entry._

 _No one can stop Duncan. Not the F.B.I, the C.I.A., or the P.T.A._

 _He once told me that the extreme always makes an impression. Well, now it's my turn._

 _Let's see how the son-of-a-bitch reacts to a suicide he didn't perform himself._


	12. Plan

Outside the Sawyer house, Duncan continued to lean against his motorcycle, finishing his cigarette and casually flicking the butt away before pulling out his .357 Magnum and checking the bullets. A smirk flickered across his face, and he tucked the gun back into his pocket before turning hand heading for the house.

* * *

In her room, Courtney hugged Brittany the cat before releasing her into the hall and shutting the door. On impulse, she yanked the Barbie off its noose and chucked it onto her desk next to her diary, which was still open to its latest entry.

* * *

Duncan made an irritated face as he realised the ladder he'd leaned against the house last time had been moved back into the shed; but a few more minutes to stew wouldn't hurt Courtney. She could wait for him.

* * *

Mrs Sawyer finished setting down three plates of spaghetti, before tutting at her husband. "Does she want a written invitation?" she huffed, turning back to the doorway. "Courtney! Dinner!"

* * *

As Duncan crawled through the window that Courtney apparently hadn't thought to shut, he realised there was something wrong with the room. Only ten minutes ago Courtney had been whimpering loud enough that he could hear it from the street. He wondered if she'd gone down to dinner, but then Mrs Sawyer's shout echoed up to him, confirming she hadn't.

Then his eyes snapped to the figure dangling above the bed from a noose of bedsheets.

* * *

Mrs Sawyer set a glass of milk at Courtney's place, her annoyance slowly giving way to worry. "Muchacha?" she called up the stairs, met only with silence.

* * *

Duncan laughed helplessly up at the hanging girl, clutching his gun in one hand and the Barbie in the other. "I can't believe you did it," he breathed. "I was _teasing._ Sure, I climbed up here to kill you, but first I was going to try and get you back with my amazing petition." He flung the gun on the bed and yanked the petition out of his pocket, savagely unrolling it onto the floor. "It's a shame you can't see what everyone _really_ signed…"

Dropping the Barbie next to the gun, he pulled a switchblade from another pocket and flicked it open, running the blade beneath the typed paragraph at the top. It peeled off, revealing another typed paragraph. "Listen. ' **We students of Westerberg High will die today. Our burning bodies will be the ultimate protest to a society that degrades us. Fuck you all.** ' Not very subtle, but then again, neither's blowing up a whole school, is it? Talk about your suicide pacts." He laughed again, wild and unsteady. "When our school explodes tomorrow, it's going to be the kind of thing that affects a generation – a Woodstock for the 80s!" He stared up at the motionless body, and suddenly all the fight went out of him. Duncan pulled a cigarette from his pocket and fumbled for his lighter. "Dammit, Courtney," he muttered around it once he'd got it lit. "We coulda toasted marshmallows together."

Mrs Sawyer's voice suddenly seeped into the room, far too close for comfort. "Muchacha, are you all right in there?"

Duncan swiftly snatched up the petition and climbed back out the window, sliding down the ladder before he could be caught. Ten seconds after he vanished into the evening, Mrs Sawyer entered the room and immediately launched into frantic screams at the sight of her daughter's final stand.

"Oh Dios Mio, I knew it! No, no! I want my baby back! I should have let you keep that job at the mall. I was just afraid of you coming home alone at night!" She didn't notice Courtney open her eyes, and continued to wail. "I made your favourite! Spaghetti! Lots of oregano!"

Casually, Courtney removed the noose from her neck and reached for the sheet that had kept her dangling, untying the knot around her waist and landing neatly on her bed. She moved a pillow over the gun Duncan had left behind in his hurry and grinned at her mother, who hadn't noticed it, too busy staring at her in utter shock.

"Hola, Mom," she smiled cheerfully, as if she hadn't just faked her own suicide. "Why so tense?"

The atmosphere at the Sawyer dinner table was, suffice to say, chilly , that night.

* * *

At the Dean household, it was similarly cold, but for different reasons. Duncan sat at his desk, fixing a bundle of wax and fuses together with duct tape. There was a knock at the door, and he turned down his stereo, which had been playing some keyboard instrumental thing he'd barely been listening to.

"I need some help with my homework…" his father called through to him.

Duncan grit his teeth, tightening the duct tape. "Sorry tiger, I'm a little busy…" Not waiting for a reply, he turned the stereo up again.

* * *

On Friday morning, the parking lot was as typically hectic as any other day, as were the hallways. Students poured out of busses and cars and dashed to their lockers, filling the school with the sound of slamming doors and oblivious chatter. Courtney didn't bother heading in until the post-lunch passing period, and kept her head ducked as she darted through the thoroughfare to her own locker, but she wasn't quick enough to escape Miles Flemming, who announced her presence by loudly choking on a styrofoam cup of presumably-shitty coffee.

"Courtney!" the drama teacher gasped, staring. "Duncan Dean told me you committed suicide last night!"

"Sorry to disappoint you," Courtney muttered, then louder, "Where is he? Where's Duncan?"

Miles ignored her, already frantically grabbing at Courtney's arm and gesturing with her coffee cup. "We have to talk. I've got some pamphlets in my office that will help you decide if suicide is really for you. Come on, let's go take a look –"

Courtney wrenched her arm away from Miles, staring at her incredulously. "Get a _job,"_ she said in disgust. She marched back to her locker, entered the combination, and swung the door open. She surreptitiously glanced up and down the hall, and suddenly froze.

At the far end of the hallway, Duncan was moving mechanically through the throngs, wearing a Walkman and stiffly carrying a duffel bag. On instinct, Courtney climbed into her locker, swinging the door towards her until to a passer-by it would have appeared locked. She waited until Duncan had passed by, and peered out, not moving as he entered the Boys bathroom.

* * *

Duncan smoothly slipped into a cubicle and closed the door, turning off his Walkman. He checked the contents of his bag, face impassive.

* * *

As the bell rang and the hallway cleared, Courtney waited until the last student had sprinted away to class before carefully hatching out of her locker. She turned in the opposite direction from the Boys bathroom and treaded down the hallway, so cautious one might have thought she feared something jumping out at her.

* * *

In the gym, Lindsay McNamara's cheer squad lazily practised cartwheels on the floor next to a small stage, which the yearbook committee was filling with folding chairs. Principle Hatchet tapped a microphone, muttering "Testing, testing, one, two, three…"

Unnoticed, Duncan slipped through the gym door, still toting the bag. He moved silently under the bleachers as the cheerleaders moved to form a practice pyramid.

* * *

Courtney silently peered around the corner to an empty hallway, and darted into it, almost like a fish that had sensed a predator.

* * *

Using heavy black masking tape, Duncan attached one of his fuse-wax-and-tape creations to a steel support under the bleachers, then glanced back to admire his work. A similar package had been taped to each support, so neatly and precisely that if anyone looked, they'd just assume it was part of the design, and not, in fact, several expertly-made home-recipe thermal bombs.

* * *

Courtney padded down the empty hallway, trying to force her hands to stay steady, but suddenly the classroom doors all burst open and students flooded out, heading back the way she'd come and sweeping her along with them, oblivious to her plight. Courtney struggled around in the crowd, trying to avoid being trampled, and latched onto Harold McGrady's arm. Harold stared down at her with a nervous smile.

"Harold, where's everybody going?" Courtney said, trying to avoid hyperventilating.

Harold blinked at her. "It's Friday," he reminded her.

Courtney groaned, realising what he meant. "Dios Mio, another damn pep assembly…"

Harold shrugged amiably, straightening his glasses. "Yeah, these things are pretty artificial, but at least we get out of class…"

Courtney barely heard him. Ignoring his attempts at conversation, she glanced around the crowd, popping up onto her tiptoes when she could, and looking for all the world like an inquisitive, well-dressed meerkat.

* * *

Duncan darted out from underneath the bleachers and slipped through the gym doors, propping them open and then dashing for a nearby set of stairs, apparently to avoid the crowd of advancing students. He leaned suavely against the wall, watching the first students enter, then headed down the stairs, no longer faking casualness but rather moving with narrow-eyed purpose.

* * *

Courtney continued to tensely surf the tidal wave of students heading for the gymnasium, but as her classmates began to file through the propped-open doors like lemmings off a cliff, she froze, her entire body filling with dread. She turned to Harold with wide eyes.

"Harold?" she asked tremulously. "What's underneath the gym?"

Harold didn't even seem to realise what he was doing as he stopped and turned dramatically to face her. "The boiler room," he replied.

Courtney blanched, turning and lunging through the crowd, barely noticing the students she was toppling as she dived for the stairs next to the doors and careened down them.


	13. Deadly

Duncan moved through the boiler room, careful not to nudge any of the pounding generators that powered the school. He stopped when he reached the heavy steel door he'd been looking for – right under the bleachers. He put down his bag and knelt to pick the lock, but before he could open it, he heard a voice that made his blood run cold – the voice of a dead woman.

"May I see your hall pass?" she inquired coldly.

Duncan spun around. Facing him was none other than Courtney, shaking slightly as she pointed his own handgun directly at his forehead.

Duncan let out a shocked chuckle. "I knew that loose was too noose," he panted, then shook his head. "I mean, noose too loose. Goddamn you, Courtney."

"Like father, like son." Courtney spoke as if she hadn't heard him. "A serious-as-fuck bomb in the boiler room that'll set off a bunch of thermals upstairs. Okay, so let's start by slowly putting the bomb on the ground."

Duncan looked down at the duffel bag at his feet, then back up at Courtney, folding his arms and smiling. Courtney's lips tightened, and she forcefully moved closer.

"Okay, okay," she muttered. "I knew that. I knew that." She shook her hair back, staring him right in the eye. "Put your hands on your head."

"You didn't say 'Simon Says'," Duncan grinned. Courtney blinked, and he swung his foot up into her ribcage. She dropped the gun as she doubled over, and he gracefully snatched it up. 

* * *

Above them, the pep assembly was in full swing, with rowdy students shouting from the bleachers, cheerleaders giggling as their pyramid swayed, and the band members valiantly struggling to be heard. The football team stood around Principal Hatchet as Leshawna's camera flashed away for the yearbook. 

* * *

Courtney stared up at Duncan through the tears that were pooling in her eyes from the pain, clutching her bruised ribs. Duncan raised the gun to her forehead.

"Live by the sword…" he quipped, but before he could finish the proverb, Courtney swung her left arm wildly, knocking his gun hand upward. As Duncan stumbled backwards, she wrenched herself to her feet and sailed her right fist into his face. It clearly annoyed him more than it hurt him, but his temporary loss of composure was enough for her to swing a second right hook into his testicles, and as Duncan collapsed to clutch himself, the gun clattered loose and skittered away.

Courtney lunged for the gun, but Duncan launched himself on top of her, crushing her underneath him and reaching out to grab the gun himself. Courtney's grip was stronger, but she wrenched it away from him with such force that she flung it the length of the boiler room, where it landed under a generator. Courtney struggled out from underneath Duncan, but as she got to her feet he scissored his legs around her ankles, tripping her. 

* * *

The assembly mindlessly blared on, with the cheerleaders hopping up and down like excited bunnies and Harold's table of geeks passing around a pair of opera glasses to intensely scope them out. A group of stoners cheerfully toked away beneath the bleachers, Izzy even lackadaisically leaning against a thermal bomb.

* * *

Snarling, Duncan launched himself to his feet, grabbing Courtney and pinning her arms to her sides.

"You think just because you started this thing, you can end it?" he growled, before violently kissing her – so hard it was almost a bite. Courtney struggled, but her then eyes locked onto a fire alarm behind Duncan. She closed her eyes and rammed her knee into his groin, yanking away from him as he crumpled a second time and darting over to pull the alarm.

Nothing happened.

Duncan panted at her from the floor. "You," he gasped, "really didn't think I'd, forget, forget, to disconnect the…"

Courtney bolted down the boiler room and moved to snatch the gun from under the generator. Duncan let out a howl, struggled upright, and bounded towards her, knocking her onto the steps back up to the school they struggled against each other, not realising that in his urge to stop her, Duncan had kicked the bag over and the bomb had tipped out of it, clicking on a digital clock that began counting down: 5:00…4:59… 4:58…

* * *

The frenzied crowd had begun a Wave; Zoey Finn and her friends joined in out of time as everyone else bounced around them. The football team waved and preened from the stage. The cheerleaders began a chant of, "Go, go, Westerburg! Go, go, Westerburg!" 

* * *

Courtney kicked Duncan off of her and crawled to the gun. As she picked it up, she noticed the bomb, its digital clock clicking to 3:04. Taking in a deep breath, she levelled the gun at Duncan as he got to his feet.

"The bomb's gone on, Duncan! How do you turn it off?" Duncan glared back. "Tell me!"

Duncan flicked open his switchblade, raising his right middle finger to point at her. "FUCK YOU!" he screamed.

Seething, Courtney pulled the trigger. There was a bang, and then Duncan was staring at the gap between his pointer and ring fingers as blood flowed over his hand. He dropped his knife to wrap his coat around his mutilated hand, and Courtney got to her feet, aching, but continuing to point the gun. Behind her, the bomb clicked down to 2:25.

"It's all over, Duncan," she repeated. "Help me to stop it."

"You want to wipe the slate clean as much as I do," Duncan replied, his voice thin and uneven, but full of conviction. "Okay, so maybe I am killing everyone in the school because no one loves me. You have a purpose though, remember? Let's face it, the only place different social types can genuinely get along with each other is in heaven."

Courtney fired the gun at his feet, making his jump backwards. The bomb clicked to 1:49, and she glanced at it again, noting the three identical red buttons beneath the clock.

"Which button do I press to turn it off? Tell me!"

"Try the red one," Duncan panted, "but seriously, people are going to look at the ashes of Westerburg and say 'there's a high school that self-destructed not because society didn't care, but because that school was society'. Is that deep or what?" He grinned painfully. "I'll let you put it in your diary, babe. Free of charge."

"Which red button, asshole?" Courtney demanded. Duncan leaned back against the door frame with a sigh.

"Press the middle one to run it off. If that's what you want, babe…"

Courtney picked up the bomb, turning her back to Duncan as she put it on a steel drum. "You know what I want, _babe?"_ she asked coolly.

"What?" Duncan replied, crouching. Courtney smirked, still with her back to him, as he snatched up the switchblade and lunged up at her. She spun away, and he accidentally brought the knife down on the middle button, stopping the bomb at 0:17.

Courtney grinned. "Cool guys like you out of my life." And for good measure, she fired two more bullets into his stomach. Duncan wailed and slumped against a generator. "But don't worry," she added, heading for the stairs. "These here were Ich Luge bullets."

Duncan slumped and fell still behind her, and Courtney wearily glanced at the image of the knife stuck in the bomb before heading back up the stairs. 

* * *

From the gym doors, Courtney watched a cheerleader cartwheel across the floor to the sound of wild cheers, almost in slow motion compared to the place she'd just left. Smiling and wiping blood from her face, she turned and walked away. 

* * *

She'd felt like she'd been in the boiler room for hours, but the sun at the front of the school told her it was 2:30 at most. She leaned against the railings of the steps and closed her eyes to bask therapeutically in the summer weather.

It was finally over.

"Colour me impressed," Duncan said behind her, and Courtney spun to see the boy she'd left for dead in the boiler room clinging to the doorway to stay upright. He made his way forward to clutch at the railing opposite her. "You really fucked me up, Princess," he continued, easing his way down the stairs. He was clutching his coat shut with his right hand, which was wrapped in a plastic bag to prevent a trail of blood from forming, but even so there was a small trail of red spatters marking the path he'd taken. Courtney could only stammer.

"I thought I… you… I…"

"You've got power, Court," Duncan sighed as he reached the bottom. "Power I didn't think you had." He moved back several paces and pulled his hand away from his coat, grinning. "The slate is clean."

His gunslinger coat fell open to reveal that he'd used duct tape to attach the bomb to his own chest. With his left hand, he hit one of the red buttons, and it began to count down again. 0:16… 0:15… 0:14…

"Pretend I did blow up the school," Duncan said softly. "All the schools! Now that you're dead…" he tilted his head to stare at her, "…what are you gonna do with your life?"

Courtney stuck her hands in her cardigan pocket, abruptly realising it was the same one she'd worn that fateful day in the woods. _God,_ it all seemed so long ago now, didn't it? But the cigarette she'd never smoked was still in there, and she brought it out and put it to her lips.

"Perfecto," she said quietly, folding her arms.

Duncan raised his arms into a crucifixion pose as the bomb clicked to 0:00. Nothing happened; annoyed, he broke his pose to sharply rap the bomb with his palm. 

* * *

The sound of the bomb exploding plunged the cheering-up-and-down pep assembly into chaos. Wailing students poured out of the bleachers, screaming less in fear and more in excitement, as Hatchet and the staff tried frantically to restore order. 

* * *

Courtney continued stood on the school steps, arms crossed and clothes blackened with ash. Flames flickered in the bushes around the bottom of the stairs, and her cigarette burned away in her mouth. Courtney took a long drag of the cigarette, before turning to go back inside. 

* * *

Courtney strolled through the hallway of howling students, some of whom had begun tearing down prom banners for the sheer thrill of it. She blew out a thin stream of smoke as Gwen rushed up to her, clad in red and looking shocked at Courtney's appearance.

"Courtney… you look like hell!"

"Yeah," Courtney grinned wildly. From the way Gwen recoiled, she knew she must look like a crazy person. "I just got back."

She tossed away her cigarette and grabbed Gwen by the shoulders, forcibly turning her around.

"What are you doing?!"

Courtney yanked the scrunchie out of Gwen's short hair, and turned the girl back round to face her. "Gwendolyn, my love, there's a new sheriff in town." And she tied the scrunchie around her own hair, and planted a noisy smooch on Gwen's cheek, grinning at the ashy stain she left on the pale skin. Gwen stared after her as she strode away, calling to the last person a member of the Alliance should have been talking to.

"Hey, Beth!" Courtney called. "Wait up!"

Beth Dunnstock, freshly released from the hospital that morning, pulled her mobility scooter to a halt, turning to gaze at Courtney in shock. As the hallway cleared out, Courtney moved to walk beside her, and Beth cautiously started the scooter up again.

"My date for the prom kind of flaked out on me," Courtney explained. "So I thought if you weren't doing anything that night we could go to the video store and rent some new releases or something. Pop some popcorn."

Beth blinked up at her for a moment, before smiling shyly, revealing shiny braces. "I'd like that."

Courtney smiled the first proper, fully happy smile she'd managed in years, wiping ash off her own face with her cardigan sleeve but probably only smearing more on. "So would I."


End file.
